WICKED Is (Not) Good
by Miranda the fangirl
Summary: Their escape was merely part of WICKED's plan. The so-called 'Paradise' was not real, and Thomas' hatred of the organization has only grown. Will he ever be able to escape WICKED? And if he is able, should he? With the world and his friends at stake, he continues the story he thought was over.
1. Paradise

Chapter 1. Paradise.

The words 'paradise' and 'hell' were by most people considered each others opposites, but there was one person who couldn't see how those words could mean anything but the same.

Namely, Thomas.

Thomas had only been in the so-called 'paradise' for a few hours at most, but he already hated it.

It wasn't the place itself- the island was relatively small, but what it lacked in size was well made up for with its impressive forests, sandy beaches, and exotic animals.

A few weeks ago, Thomas would have been eager to explore his new home, but now his thoughts were too preoccupied to take in the stunning landscape.

He thought of Teresa.

Brave, smart Teresa, who had saved Thomas from getting crushed by an enormous stone, sacrificing her own life in the process. Thomas would have gladly switched places with her at that moment, the guilt churning inside of him was crushing him, just like the stone had crushed her.

He thought of chuck, who had been almost like his younger brother.

He too had sacrificed himself for Thomas, or at least, that's what he'd thought. Later he had learned that WICKED had been to blame, controlling Chuck, making him step in front of Thomas. the sadness pierced Thomas like the knife that had ended his friend's life.

He thought of Alby. The Glade's leader.

not a very nice guy, but a strong leader nonetheless.

Alby, who had known of the horrors awaiting the gladers outside the maze, had decided that sacrificing himself would be better than returning.

Thomas now knew just how right Alby was about the outside world.

He thought of Newt, who hadn't been immune.

Seeing his friend slowly succumbing to the madness had torn Thomas apart. And then there was their last encounter when Newt -almost completely insane- had told Thomas about how he hated the maze, hated Thomas. About how he had tried to end his misery in the maze.

And then he had forced Thomas to shoot him. He had begged him, convinced him of how it was the right thing to do. And Thomas had done it. He'd shot his best friend. It made him feel numb, too miserable to even feel the misery.

Thomas knew for sure that he would never be able to live fully because a part of him had died along with Newt.

Then there were his few remaining friends.

There was Minho, who hadn't spoken to Thomas for several hours. he probably hadn't spoken to anyone else for that matter. He had worn an uncharacteristic frown, and Thomas knew that he was wondering where Newt was. If he was still alive.

Thomas wondered if he would ever be able to tell Minho what he'd done to their friend. probably not.

He knew that if he did, Minho would tell Thomas that it wasn't his fault, that it had been the best thing to do, and that would make Thomas feel even worse about it.

Besides, he didn't want to crush Minho's hopes about Newt still being alive. His friend needed something to hold onto, one tiny spark of hope, the spark that Thomas didn't have.

There was Frypan. He hadn't said anything either. He had been using productivity as a distraction, always doing something; building shelters, preparing meals, anything to keep his thoughts away from what they had all been through.

Thomas envied him for his ability to get lost in his work. If only he could escape his memories so easily.

There was Gally. Thomas didn't even know what to think of him anymore.

In the Glade, they'd hated each other, a feeling which had increased after he had killed Chuck.

Of course, now Thomas knew that Gally had been forced to do it by WICKED, and he knew just how guilty Gally felt.

Every time Thomas saw him now he was filled with pity.

He hadn't seen much of Gally after their fight against WICKED, the other boy had been just as silent as the others, from where he'd been sitting in the corner. There was an empty, broken look in his eyes, and Thomas wondered if it would ever go away.

Then there was Brenda. Unlike the others, she had been talking constantly. Thomas felt a little annoyed, but he tried not to show it. He understood that it was her way of coping with the trauma of the past few days. Still, Thomas wished she would go talk to someone else, especially when she'd reached the topic of their relationship. Thomas wanted to tell her that he just didn't feel the same way as she did, but he knew he couldn't tell her that now, She'd been through enough already.

He decided that he would tell her later when things had calmed down a little. When she could take the news. Now Thomas decided that it would be best to avoid her.

Thomas sighed as he sat down on a cliff he'd found while mindlessly walking around the island. He felt a little guilty about leaving his friends like that, but he needed some time alone.

He'd been pacing back and forth on the cliff he now sat on, he didn't know for how long, but the sun was starting to set.

He knew that he should return to the others, -he didn't want them to worry about him- but instead, he stayed in place, staring down at the ocean ten meters below him. The sinking sun made the water turn a color similar to blood.

There was a sudden ' _snap',_ coming from behind him, as if someone had stepped on a twig.

Thomas shot to his feet immediately, ready to defend himself if needed.

When there weren't any more sounds, Thomas took a few cautious steps towards the direction of the disturbance. It appeared to have come from behind a cluster of large bushes.

It was probably just an animal, probably nothing to worry about, but Thomas couldn't be sure about anything these days.

He stepped around the bush, and suddenly there was a gun pointed at his chest.

Thomas froze in place, not knowing what else to do.

The person standing opposite him had an impeccably white lab coat, blond hair in a tight bun and a grave look on her face.

It was Ava Paige.

Thomas was confused for three reasons.

One: she should not have been there.

Two: she _could_ not have been there.

And three: she looked ready to shoot him.

Thomas thought she had been on his side. After all, she had stopped the rat-man from taking his brain, and then she'd told him about the flat-trans that would lead him and his friends to safety.

It made sense in a way though; WICKED had ruined his life, so why not take it too?

"Congratulations, Thomas," she said with a cold smile "you have made it to the end of the fourth trial."

"What-?" Thomas started, but he was interrupted.

"You have performed well, and you have given us more information in our search for a cure. Thank you for your help." The disingenuous smile widened.

 _The fourth trial. What does she mean? Has this whole thing just been another test? Another variable? Did they plan our escape? Newt's death? Everything?_

Thomas' head swirled with thoughts and he was growing angrier by the second.

He wanted to destroy WICKED, every last one of those wretched scientists. Almost all of his friends were dead, and for what? A bunch of useless brain patterns? A cure that, let's face it, wasn't going to happen?

No. Thomas refused to be a test subject for any longer.

He marched towards the chancellor, glaring at her defiantly, daring her to shoot him. He knew she wasn't going to do it, he was, after all, one of her most precious lab rats, 'the final candidate'. She needed him to continue her useless research.

He was sick of it. If she shot him it would be much more merciful than putting him through another trial of heartbreak and trauma.

To Thomas' astonishment, a loud 'bang' cut through the peacefulness of the evening air. He was too shocked to register that a bullet had gone through his chest and out the other side, the force knocking him backward. He fell to the ground and made no efforts to get up. Everything felt unreal, from the dull pain spreading through his body to the warm blood flowing from the wound.

The last thing he saw before slipping into unconsciousness was Ava Paige, smiling serenely, the gun still in her grasp and a speck of blood on her white lab coat.


	2. Awakening

Chapter 2. Awakening.

With a jolt, Thomas' senses came back to life, along with immense disorientation and about a hundred questions. Questions like: 'how am I alive' and 'what the shuck is happening'.

Opening his eyes didn't help in the slightest since all he saw was blackness.

A surge of panic threatened to overwhelm him, but Thomas knew from experience that panicking wasn't going to lead anywhere. He decided to approach the situation calmly instead. That's what Newt would have done. (Not that it had helped him in the end).

He thought that maybe taking deep breaths would help.

That's when Thomas realized he was immersed in water.

Somehow he'd missed the fact that he was floating in water, a fact which he hadn't realized until he had inhaled liquid rather than air.

He forgot completely about staying calm. All rational thoughts abandoned him and he started to panic, waving his arms around wildly, searching for something, anything.

What he found were walls, four of them, just close enough to make him feel claustrophobic.

The water he'd accidentally inhaled felt like acid in his throat, making him want to cough.

He felt like his brain was about to explode. Partly from the lack of oxygen, but mostly from the confusion. Had he somehow survived getting shot, only to be drowned when that didn't kill him?

He felt certain that it was WICKED's doing, because honestly, everything seemed to be WICKED's doing these days, and they were the ones who had tried to kill him most recently, but it didn't really matter at the moment, if he didn't get out of wherever he was, he was going to die.

Thomas kicked one of the walls in an attempt to break it, but his foot traveled too slowly in the water.

He pounded on the wall with his fists instead, but that had little more effect.

He got so desperate that he even tried shouting for help, which was pretty stupid of him; not only did the water fill his mouth, but he also didn't even make a sound.

Thomas gave up. He didn't really see any point in continuing, it wasn't taking him anywhere. His airway was filled with water, if he didn't get any air soon it would be over.

Besides, he didn't really have anything to go back to if he survived.

Sure, he still had his friends, but they were all as sad and miserable as Thomas. None of them really knew what to do, they needed a leader, but no one was willing to take charge. If only Newt had been there. He was called 'the glue' for a reason. He held the group together. If he'd lived, then things would have been different.

Thomas had never really given much thought to religion, but he found himself wondering if there was such a thing as the afterlife. He hoped so.

Then he would get to see them again. Newt, Teresa, Chuck. Maybe they were waiting for him.

And Thomas was coming.

He was just about to stop resisting and give in to the water when he was suddenly rescued.

The wall in front of him was no longer there, and the water was spilling out, pulling Thomas with it.

He stumbled out of the small chamber, nearly falling over.

He coughed and wretched to rid his lungs of water while sucking in air greedily.

Once he'd recovered somewhat he realized that he was kneeling on a cracked, grimy, white-tiled floor. The water had disappeared through a bunch of small holes in said floor, leaving Thomas drenched, cold and confused.

He then realized that he wasn't alone, he could hear the sound of someone else's breathing. He stood up quickly to face the potential threat, but before he could see anything the unknown person slammed into him.

It took Thomas a split second to realize that he wasn't being attacked. He was, in fact, being hugged.

Thomas' face was buried in the person's clothing, thus he had no clue who was hugging him, or whether he should return the act of affection. That is until the person spoke.

"Tommy, I'm so sorry," the person said, with an all too familiar accent.

"Newt?" Thomas asked. His voice, already weak from the near-death experience, was muffled. He doubted it had been heard, but it didn't matter, he already knew for certain. There was no mistaking that voice.

Newt didn't respond, he only hugged Thomas tighter.

Thomas wrapped his arms around his friend, not even caring that Newt was supposed to be dead. Not caring about anything, really. Except for the fact that Newt was there, alive and breathing.

Thomas didn't know how long the hug lasted, and when Newt broke the embrace, Thomas didn't want to let go, but he knew he had to, so he did.

Thomas took a step back and looked at his friend. He searched for any sign of the wounds he'd had when they'd last encountered, but Newt looked perfectly normal, aside from the fact that his clothes were almost as soaked as Thomas' from hugging him.

"Newt? How…? Why…?" Thomas had so many questions that he didn't even know where to start.

"Am I dead?" Was what he finally got out.

"I don't know," Newt responded "maybe. But I don't think so."

"What do you mean?" Thomas asked.

"Well, when I… Died… I just woke up in that thing," Newt pointed at a small chamber on the other side of the room that looked exactly like the one Thomas had been in.

"And I don't know about you, but I didn't wake up in the clothes I died in," He continued.

Thomas looked down at his own outfit and found that it was entirely different from the clothes he'd been wearing before.

He looked up slowly.

"So, you're thinking… It wasn't real?"

Newt nodded slowly.

"I mean, this is WICKED we're talking about, they're always playing mind-games on us," he said.

"You're right," Thomas admitted. "this feels like something they would do. And before I woke up, I met Ava Paige, she told me I had completed the fourth trial. Then she shot me, and then I was here. But how much do you think was fake? was everything just an illusion?"

"I hope it was," Newt said, "that would mean everyone is still alive."

Thomas thought it seemed a little too optimistic, but he wanted to believe it, desperately, and there was really no point in opposing the idea.

"Have you seen anyone else?" Thomas asked, looking around the room as he said so, but he couldn't see any people, or chambers, aside from the ones he and Newt had been in.

"No," Newt said. "Maybe they're being kept somewhere else."

Thomas nodded. He pushed his wet hair away from his face and gave the room a once-over. It was empty aside from the two cubicles. The room looked like it hadn't been cleaned for ages.

He walked over to the cubicle he'd just exited. It resembled a large shower stall from where it stood on a small platform, with one of its walls pushed to the side. Speaking of the walls, they were all white, rather than see-through, and the inside was much cleaner than the outside.

Thomas peered into the cubicle to find it empty.

"What happened exactly?" Thomas asked.

"Not sure," Newt said, "when I woke up I nearly drowned in one of these, then it just opened. I tried to open the other one, but it wouldn't budge. I had no idea you were in it until it just opened and you fell out of it."

"But how were we able to breathe before we woke up?" Thomas wondered.

Newt shrugged. "Who knows?"

"Well, neither of us do," Thomas said, "so, are we stuck in this room?"

"No, there's another room," Newt explained, gesturing at something behind Thomas. He turned to see a slightly rusted door.

"I went in there, but I didn't find anything interesting except for a door that's probably the exit. Locked, naturally."

"Naturally," Thomas repeated, "we might as well check it out in case you missed something."

He walked the short distance to the door and opened it. He let Newt walk through first and then followed him inside.


	3. Decision

Chapter 3. Decision.

Thomas didn't know what he'd expected before he went into the other room, but what he saw was definitely not it.

This room was much smaller than the previous one, and, judging by the large amount of dusty crates stacked in clumsy piles, it was some kind of storage room. Though he supposed 'had been' would be more appropriate if the stale air, dust and mold-infested walls were anything to go by.

The only interesting things about the room were the two doors, one on the opposite wall from where they had entered and one on the right. Both doors looked extremely worn down, but they looked like they were functioning well enough.

Thomas moved to the door on his right since it looked to be in worse shape than the other. If it was locked, Thomas might be able to kick it off its hinges.

But before he could reach the door, Newt put a hand on Thomas' shoulder, stopping him. Thomas turned to look at Newt, who was shaking his head.

"Don't go in there. I think it was used to store food, but now it looks and smells like something from the Crank Palace."

The words 'Crank Palace' triggered a string of painful memories.

Thomas remembered his last visit to the 'Palace'. When they had come to rescue Newt from the place. His friend had refused to come with them. He had threatened to shoot him and the others if they didn't leave him to rot in that awful place. Thomas' heart ached at the memory. Then it plummeted like a rock.

Did Newt still have the Flare? The mere idea made Thomas feel like crying. He didn't think he could stand it if he had to go through it all over again.

He forced himself to snap out of it and think logically. There _was_ a fairly large possibility that he wasn't infected. He hadn't started showing signs of it until after the scorch, which was where he must have caught it. If everything had been fake, or at the very least everything that happened after the Maze, then he wouldn't have been exposed to the virus. That was under the assumption that he could catch it in the first place. He could very well be immune. Actually, there wasn't any definite proof about _anyone's_ immunity or lack thereof.

He supposed time would tell, though the wait would be agonizing.

He turned to look at Newt. He looked just as he should have. His face wasn't twisted in a hateful sneer, his eyes weren't glazed over from insanity. He looked healthy, and kind, like he always had, though now he also looked slightly bewildered.

"Why are you staring at me?" He asked.

"It's just… nothing," Thomas said, changing his mind mid-sentence. He couldn't exactly tell Newt outright that he was wondering if he had the Flare. He didn't need to burden him like that.

Unfortunately, Newt was able to guess what he was thinking.

"You're wondering if I have the Flare. Aren't you?"

Thomas wasn't sure how to respond.

"Look, I'm sorry. It's just, I couldn't help wondering…" he trailed off.

"Don't be sorry, it only makes sense you'd want to know, especially after how I acted before," Newt said, though he looked deflated.

"Well, _do_ you have it?" Thomas asked tentatively.

Newt shrugged helplessly. "I can't be sure, but… I think so. I feel like I felt before when it started."

Thomas had tried to brace himself for the possibility, but that didn't do much to lessen the blow. He bowed his head to spare his friend the sight of his distraught expression.

"I'm sorry," Newt said, his voice unsteady with emotion, "I- I promise I won't be like I was before. I won't force you to- to-" he trailed off.

"It won't come to that," Thomas promised, "this must all be a part of WICKED's plan. We've done so much, come so far. They must be close to getting the cure now. If we just continue helping them-"

"Helping WICKED? Come on Tommy, they aren't any closer to the cure now than they were when they started. They will just continue with their pointless variables until everyone's dead. We have to escape, you said as much yourself, then at least some of you will have a chance."

"What I said before was dumb, and selfish. I regret it more than anything I've ever done. After you died I knew that I would never be able to forgive myself. Now I have a chance to make it right, and I won't waste it."

"It wasn't your fault! It was mine. You don't have to do anything, especially something that might cost you your life. I'll feel better knowing that at least you'll survive."

"Well if _you_ don't survive, then _I_ won't either. I'll never be able to recover if you die!" Thomas said loudly.

"You may think so now, but you'll move on eventually." Newt looked as if he was struggling to keep calm.

"Not if I have to live with the knowledge that I could have saved you. It's not too late, okay? Stop acting like it is!"

"But it _is_. They've been trying to find a cure for _years,_ I have _weeks_ ,"

"I have to at least try. Please, don't give up yet. Can you do that for me?"

Newt sighed. "Fine, but if it doesn't work you have to promise me to save yourself."

"I promise," Thomas said.

He extended his hand. Newt took it, and they shook hands on it. Their hands remained clasped for a bit longer than necessary. Until the door opened with a creak.

Thomas immediately stepped in front of Newt, or he tried. Newt had apparently decided to step in front of Thomas.

They both ended up not standing in front of anyone and tripping each other in the process.

When they'd both gotten back to their feet someone else was in the room. Thomas recognized the person, unfortunately.

"If you're done debating, please follow me," said Rat Man.


	4. Attempt

Chapter 4. Attempt.

The WICKED-facility reminded Thomas of the maze. Corridors seemed to stretch out endlessly as Thomas and Newt were led somewhere, surrounded by half a dozen guards pointing launchers at them. Leading the way was Rat Man, who would occasionally look back at Thomas and smile smugly.

Thomas did not pay him much attention; he was too busy trying to process everything around him.

For starters, the corridors they walked through weren't as clinically white as Thomas was used to when dealing with WICKED. Though not nearly as bad as the storage room, the whole building appeared to be in pretty bad shape. It all looked worn down and faded, the color-scheme more grey than white. A few times Thomas saw red-brown stains, that looked disturbingly like dried blood.

He wondered what had happened. Maybe there had been crank-attacks, though Thomas had a hard time imagining anyone getting inside. Maybe if the cranks attacking had been people working for WICKED when they got infected, that would be one way to explain it.

Maybe more people were getting infected in general, causing a shortage in cleaning staff.

Or, if there were more cranks than before, some of them might have managed to get inside.

It could have been a combination of all three, though he had no way to be sure. He didn't know how much of the actual world he'd seen. The state of it after he had escaped WICKED had been terrible, but he wasn't even sure if that was real. If not, had WICKED made the world out to be better or worse?

If the world was like he'd seen it, would a cure even be able to fix everything? A huge part of the world's population had died, and most of the remaining people had the flare. If they found the cure they would probably need a lot of resources to make more of it, not to mention transport it and give it to those infected.

And if they were unlucky, the cure might not work on those who were past the gone, which meant both that a large number of people couldn't be saved and that the people who _could_ be saved were in danger of getting hurt by cannibalistic lunatics.

And if they managed to stop the flare, would the world go back to normal?

After all, the solar flares that started the whole thing had rendered a lot of land useless. Even if the population was smaller than it used to be, there was still a lot of people. People who would need food and shelter. Maybe more than the planet could provide at the moment.

Thomas was so lost in thought that he didn't notice that the others had stopped walking. He just continued forward, which resulted in him colliding with the guard in front of him.

The guard turned around and pointed his launcher at Thomas.

"Watch it, kid," the guard said through a sneer, not lowering the weapon.

Thomas tried to back away, but somehow he managed to trip over his own feet and he would have fallen over had Newt not caught him.

Once Newt had helped Thomas regain his balance he crossed his arms and glared threateningly at the guard. The guard glared back. For a moment it looked like the guard was going to shoot, but he eventually lowered the launcher and turned away.

Thomas wasn't too surprised; Newt didn't glare much, but when he did he could intimidate just about anyone, even ill-tempered WICKED-guards.

Then Newt shot Thomas an exasperated look that he had seen many times before, he knew it meant 'why can't you just be careful?'

Thomas sighed. He knew that he wasn't careful enough, he usually didn't care if he got in trouble, but he realized that he would have to at least _try_ to be more careful, he didn't want to upset Newt more than he had to and risk speeding up the process of the Flare.

Thomas gave Newt a reassuring smile. Newt did not look very reassured.

Thomas sighed and shifted his attention to the rat man, who was having trouble opening a door, something he apparently thought was the guards' fault because he was yelling at them.

"What do you mean you don't know the new password?" He asked them angrily.

"No one told us about a new password," said the guard who had threatened Thomas with a launcher.

"Then why didn't you ask someone who knew?" the rat man demanded.

"There wasn't any time," Another guard replied. "Those kids were trying to escape, all of us were needed."

'Those kids'? Was the guard talking about their friends? Thomas looked at Newt, who had a hopeful look on his face. He'd reached the same conclusion.

"Yeah, those kids are vicious fighters," another guard chimed in casually, "especially considering they've been in a coma for-"

The guard didn't get to finish his sentence, the rat man had yanked a launcher from the nearest guard and fired it at him.

The poor guy had probably been about to give away more valuable information, but now he was lying on the floor, convulsing. But now Thomas knew something at least. If his friends had been in some kind of coma, then he and Newt had probably been in a coma too, which supported their theory on what had happened.

Thomas looked at Rat Man and remembered that he had been infected before. What if he had the Flare now, too? Shooting someone with a launcher to get them to shut up seemed rather crank-like. Sure, it had probably been important information, but there were better ways to handle the situation, like simply telling him to shut up.

Then again, you never knew with Rat Man, this could easily have been normal for him, considering his apparent lack of morals and constant bad mood.

He wondered if Rat Man still wanted to dissect his brain in order to find a cure, or if that had been some kind of variable. He hoped it had been, but he had an uncanny feeling that Rat Man would gladly attempt it again if given a chance, especially if he had the flare. He would have to be careful around him, and he would have to warn Newt, and his other friends if he could find them, about Rat Man, since not everyone knew about his possible status as a crank.

Rat Man may not look very intimidating (in fact, he even appeared slightly comical), but Thomas knew now that underestimating him would not be smart. He was capable of many things, though getting through the door wasn't one of them.

Rat Man had apparently decided that complaining and banging on the door wasn't going to do anything. Instead, he pulled out some sort of device from his pocket. It looked like a walkie-talkie, only it was more complicated, with a bunch of strange-looking buttons on it.

He pushed one of the buttons, and after a while, a bored voice responded with: "Hello, this is Systems engineer Johnson from the tech department. State your name and business".

"This is Assistant director Janson, and I need the password for the door in corridor A8. Now."

Thomas wondered if Rat Man was in a rush or if he was just impatient.

Maybe luck was finally on his side. If that tech-person told Rat Man the code Thomas and Newt would hear it too. Thomas didn't think one password to one door that probably wasn't even the exit would do much good, but knowing something was better than knowing nothing.

Thomas listened carefully as the walkie-talkie conversation kept going.

"If you are assistant director, shouldn't you know the password?" Johnson asked.

"I was busy," Rat Man said, "the guards were supposed to know, but they didn't, because they're all _idiots,_ " he aimed the last word at the guards.

There were protests from a number of the so-called idiots, which spiraled into a full-fledged argument.

Thomas saw an opportunity then. The guards were all standing with Rat Man. They seemed to have forgotten the two Gladers behind them. If they could escape… Well, it was risky, they could find themselves not finding an exit, or getting lost, or maybe one of the guards would look back and notice that they were trying to get away; and even if they didn't, they were bound to notice once they got the door open. But if they had a chance at getting away it would be worth the risk.

Then Thomas remembered that Newt needed the cure, and they would have to work with WICKED to find it. But what if it didn't need to be 'they'?WICKED had talked about how Thomas was the strongest candidate, whatever that meant. Maybe they would only need him. Maybe he and Newt could break out together, find a hiding place for Newt, and then Thomas could return to WICKED alone.

Of course, there was the problem with getting Newt to agree to stay behind, and he didn't really trust Newt not to give up on himself and do something rash, But those were problems he would have to deal with later.

He tapped Newt on the shoulder to get his attention. Then he pointed at the empty corridors behind them and mouthed 'escape'.

Newt didn't even need to think about it. He nodded, and the two Gladers started to run, making almost no sound as they went into the nearest side-corridor. All sound went undetected because Rat Man and the guards were yelling at each other.

The corridor was thankfully not a dead end. It parted into three other corridors. They decided that the one on the right would be the best since they would be less visible if Rat Man and the guards came looking.

As they made their way through the corridor, Thomas could faintly hear Rat Man yelling "Find them!"

The boys sped up, making their way to the end of the corridor, which ended with a door.

The door was locked, unsurprisingly. But it didn't look very strong. Thomas knew that the sound of him kicking it down would alert the guards to their location, but it wasn't as if they could go back and try another door. He could hear footsteps coming closer.

Thomas kicked at the door, but it was a lot sturdier than he'd thought, it didn't even budge.

The escape plan didn't look so great anymore.

The guards had spotted them. Half a dozen launchers were aimed at Thomas and Newt.

He noticed that the guard standing closest was twitching, he was probably the one Rat Man had shot earlier.

Then it happened. The twitching guard shouldn't have held his finger on the trigger. It wasn't surprising that he accidentally pulled it.

Thomas realized that it would hit Newt if he didn't prevent it, so prevent it he did. He shoved Newt to the side, then he tried to follow him out of the launcher's path. He did not succeed.

The projectile almost missed him, but it grazed his arm, sending a jolt of electricity through him. It wasn't as bad as it should have been though, maybe that launcher was designed to be weaker than normal launchers, or maybe it was because it had only grazed him.

It still hurt though.

Thomas collapsed to the floor, wishing he could pass out, though he remained annoyingly conscious. He could see Newt crouching beside him. he was saying something, but Thomas couldn't hear what. He could also see Rat Man, looking smugger than ever.

After what felt like an eternity, the pain wore off, though Thomas' whole body was shaking uncontrollably.

Newt helped him up.

Thomas glared at Rat Man, who only smiled back.

"If you try pulling a stunt like that again," Rat Man threatened, "the next launcher-grenade will hit him," he pointed at Newt.

Thomas' blood boiled with rage, but he knew there was no point in trying to put up a fight. The Gladers followed Rat Man once again.

Thomas couldn't believe he'd once thought WICKED was good.


	5. Reunion

Chapter 5. Reunion.

Nobody spoke as Thomas and Newt were lead back to the corridor they'd been in before trying to escape. This time Rat Man had no problem with opening the door. He pushed some buttons on a panel on the door, and to Thomas' disappointment, he held one of his hands in front of the panel so the gladers couldn't see the password. He realized how stupid it had been to try to escape. Now Rat Man was suspicious of them. If they had just decided to bide their time they might've heard or seen what the password was. Now they had nothing except for each other.

But what if WICKED separated them? Thomas shuddered at the thought. He would never willingly let Newt out of his sight again. Not after Denver. Thomas wondered how long Newt had been in the berg before getting caught and sent to the Crank Palace. It probably hadn't been real, not physically anyway. But it had felt so real, and even if their bodies hadn't been there, their minds had.

Thomas wondered what it felt like to go insane as Newt had. It must've been horrifying, losing control to the virus. And now it was happening again unless Thomas could find a way to stop it. He knew he had to succeed, he would not let his friend go through the same thing again.

Thomas wondered what the others would do if- no, not if, _when_ they were reunited. He was sure none of them would want to cooperate with WICKED after everything that had happened. would Thomas be able to convince them to help him? If it meant saving Newt he was positive that the gladers would at least listen. he would have to come up with a plan, which would have to include getting the cure, saving Newt, and destroying, or at least escaping WICKED. Why could things never be easy?

He decided to start by gathering as much information as he could, getting a hang of the situation. Everyone at WICKED kept saying that they were close to finding a cure, but they never seemed to be getting any closer. Were they lying in an attempt to motivate them? Thomas would have to find out. Maybe he could strike a deal with them, information in exchange for his cooperation. But how could he be sure that the information wasn't just lies? The only thing he could think of was asking different persons about the same thing, he might find out if he was being lied to then, assuming everyone wasn't in on it.

Thomas still despised the thought of cooperating with WICKED, but at the moment he would just have to deal with it.

Suddenly Thomas heard something. It sounded like voices, though he couldn't hear what they were saying. He looked at the others around him, but he was pretty sure it hadn't been any of them.

It got louder as they walked, and Thomas felt a sliver of hope. were they about to get reunited with their friends?

They stopped in front of another door. At first, Thomas thought Rat Man didn't have the password again, but he realized that wasn't the case when the rat man turned around to look at them.

"I'm sure you are eager to meet your friends," Rat began, "but before we go inside, just know that we can easily separate all of you if you cause any trouble, and you know what will happen if you try to escape again. I'd recommend being on your best behavior."

With that, he opened the door, and Thomas resisted the urge to run inside when he saw his friends.

Most of the people in the room were sitting on chairs or couches, talking rapidly to each other, but when they saw Thomas and Newt, most of the conversation died down.

Minho stood up from his chair and approached them cautiously, a few of the others behind him.

"what's wrong?" Thomas asked him. Then he realized Minho wasn't looking at him, he was looking at Newt.

"Newt?"

"That's me," Newt said, a bit awkwardly.

"But you look… Well, normal," Minho said hesitantly, "are you still…? you know…"

"A crank?" Newt said, finishing the sentence.

Minho's gaze fell to the floor. Newt sighed.

"Well, I s'pose I am, though I'm not as far gone as before."

"Before…" Minho repeated thoughtfully.

He looked up with an expression that showed sadness, but not surprise.

"Don't worry, I still have a little time left, and I promise I won't threaten to shoot you again," Newt said hurriedly in an attempt to cheer his friend up.

Minho forced a smile, but he was obviously not out of genuine happiness. "Don't worry, we'll find a way," he said

"You sound just like Tommy," Newt sighed, though he sounded more endeared than annoyed.

"Speaking of Thomas," Minho looked at him, "where the shuck did you go?"

"Nowhere really, I just needed to think," Thomas said.

"You can think?" Minho asked in mock-surprise.

"Very funny," Thomas said, rolling his eyes.

"Well, going off to think was one of your few smart decisions," Minho said.

"How so?"

"Well, the rest of us got sucked into the sea by this huge wave and I'm surprised none of us drowned," Minho explained.

"Are you sure about that?" Thomas asked.

"Sure about what?"

"Are you sure you didn't drown?" Thomas specified.

"Do I look like a ghost to you?" Minho asked.

"No, but I got shot in the head, and I sho- I mean, Newt died."

Thomas cursed himself for almost telling Minho what had happened.

"Wait, what?" Minho asked, looking at him with wide eyes.

Thomas was about to respond but was interrupted by the nasal voice of Rat Man.

"Listen up, everyone!" He shouted from the other side of the room, where he was standing on some kind of stage like he was about to give a speech.

"I know that you are confused. Please get seated and I will explain everything".

Thomas hadn't noticed until then that the chairs and couches were all facing Rat Man's direction.

Thomas sat down on a couch along with Newt and a very confused Minho.

 _This explanation better be good,_ he thought as he fixed his attention on Rat Man.


	6. Explanation

Chapter 6. Explanation.

Thomas sighed for the third time in the minute they'd been sitting down, waiting for Rat Man to start talking. Rat Man kept shuffling around with some papers that were lying on a table next to him, apparently no longer eager to get started. He appeared to be waiting for them to get impatient. Whether it was to rile them up or just to be annoying, Thomas didn't know, but he was getting tired of it.

"Minho, no," he heard Newt say from where he was sitting on the middle of the couch. Thomas looked to the left and saw that Minho was getting up. It was clear from his angry expression and clenched fists what he was going to do if no one stopped him.

Newt tugged at his sleeve in an attempt to get him to sit down, whispering to him angrily about how he was being stupid and pointing out that he would get shot by one of the guards before he even made it to Rat Man.

As much as Thomas wanted to see someone punch Rat Man in his smug face, Newt was right, the guards were already looking at them, Minho wouldn't make it a meter before he got shot.

Besides, there was more at stake, they would have to be careful, lie low until no one was suspicious of them anymore, not like that was going to happen anytime soon, but still.

He wished he could have had time to explain that to Minho, but now it was too late, Rat Man had noticed the commotion.

He dropped the papers and started walking towards them, stopping in front of Minho. He stood far enough away that Minho wouldn't be able to punch him, but close enough to make it tempting. A guard stepped closer, but the rat man held up a hand, gesturing for her to stop. He clearly thought he had the upper hand, and he was probably right.

"Do we have a problem here, Mr. Minho?" He asked.

"Yes! We have several problems. How about you explain what the shuck is happening?" Minho said, gesturing angrily with his hands while speaking.

"Well, I was just-" Rat Man started.

"Oh, don't tell me you were getting to that, you were just trying to provoke us!" Minho interrupted.

Rat Man looked at him sourly, not even trying to deny that it had been exactly what he was doing.

"You want to know what's happening? Fine, I'll tell you, but trust me, sometimes not knowing is better than knowing," Rat Man said, speaking in clipped tones.

He turned around, going back to the stage, but before he could, Minho shouted at him: "and by the way, if you ever refer to me as 'Mr. Minho' again I'll punch the smugness out of that rat face of yours."

Rat Man's eyes lit up with fury, and for a moment Thomas thought he would attack Minho. Thankfully he didn't, he just heaved a sigh and returned to the platform.

Minho sat down and looked at Thomas and Newt. Both of them were glaring at him.

Minho didn't even have the decency to look ashamed.

Then Newt whispered something to him that Thomas didn't hear. Minho looked skeptically at Thomas, then back at Newt.

"Are you sure?" He whispered to Newt, loud enough for Thomas to hear this time.

"No, but can you please just shut up?" Newt whispered back. His voice sounded just a little bit too harsh, which worried Thomas. He hoped Minho had noticed it too though, he didn't want Minho to feel worried too, but he would hopefully be more careful. Thomas remembered all too well how the two of them had been fighting during their escape from WICKED, and he wasn't eager for a repeat of that.

Thomas wanted to convey that message to Minho, but he wasn't looking at Thomas. He looked at Newt with concern. Newt, in turn, looked guiltily down at his shoes.

None of them were looking at Rat Man, though that was apparently what he thought they should be doing.

He cleared his throat loudly. In fact, it was too loud than should have been possible.

Thomas looked at him and saw that he was holding a microphone.

"Good, now that I have everyone's attention-" he gave Thomas a pointed look, "-we can begin."

"I'm sure you're all wondering about what happened to you." At this, there was a hum of agreement from around the room.

"Well, basically we put all of you in a medically induced coma after your second trial, which was roughly three months ago."

Chatter broke out among the two groups at this new information. Thomas kept quiet, though he was just as confused. The coma thing didn't surprise him, but _three months_? How was that possible? It couldn't have been more than half that time.

Once the talking died down Rat Man continued.

"As some of you may have already guessed by now, the third and fourth trials were simulations. It wasn't real, but the new brain patterns are promising. We are closer than ever to finding a cure. Now, I know that this is shocking to you, but the questions will have to wait until later. Hopefully, this will answer some of your questions." He pointed at the wall behind him, and suddenly it lit up.

Thomas realized that the wall wasn't a wall. It was an enormous screen that covered almost the entire wall.

The screen showed footage of Thomas in the awful room he'd been in for his third trial. At the corner of the screen was a picture of a brain, presumably Thomas', Different parts of it lit up with a blue light as he moved on the screen. He knew that those were the brain patterns everyone was always talking about, though they didn't really mean anything to Thomas.

The image changed. This time it showed Teresa, running through a corridor in the WICKED establishment, shouting Thomas' name. It must have been during their escape from WICKED.

Thomas realized then that he hadn't seen Teresa in the room. A jolt of panic hit him, and he looked around the room in search for her.

To his relief he found her, sitting with some girls from group B. She was looking at the screen in wonder and didn't see Thomas, but that was just as well, he couldn't talk to her at the moment anyway. He would definitely talk to her afterwards though.

The image shifted to Newt, alone in the berg until the red shirts came. Newt begged them to let him write a letter to his friends. He looked on the brink of crying, which Thomas found utterly heartbreaking. As if that wasn't enough, he saw that the brain in the corner was covered in red spots, symbolizing the flare.

After a few minutes worth of other images, the one thing Thomas was dreading the most appeared.

Newt and him, the latter shouting at Thomas to kill him.

A lump formed in Thomas' throat, his eyes were stinging. It had been bad enough to see that image in his mind.

The screen didn't have high volume, but the sound of the gun firing felt deafening to Thomas.

Suddenly someone's fist connected with the side of Thomas' head. He looked to the side to find that Newt was struggling in an attempt to keep a furious Minho away from Thomas.

Minho was glaring at Thomas so intensely that Thomas was sure Minho wanted to murder him.

He could practically feel a bruise forming from where he'd been hit.

If Newt hadn't been sitting between them Thomas would probably have been done for.

"Minho, stop it! It's not his fault!" Newt said in an attempt to calm Minho down.

"He shot you!" Minho yelled, his voice cracking with emotion.

"I wanted him to. I forced him to do it," Newt spoke calmly.

"How could you? Both of you." Minho's voice was barely more than a whisper, and he sounded more hurt than angry.

He was no longer fighting against Newt, instead, he embraced him, holding on to him tightly as if he would disappear otherwise. He started to shake, and Thomas realized he was sobbing. Newt held him, tears were forming in his eyes too, but he was trying to keep them at bay.

Thomas' heart throbbed with guilt. He wished more than ever that he hadn't done it, hadn't found another way. The only thing that held him together was the knowledge that it didn't have to be like that. Now they had a chance, and Thomas was not going to waste it, even if that meant dying.


	7. Gathering

_Authors note:_ I'm really sorry about how long it took me to update, I'll try to update every week from now on. as compensation I made this chapter a bit longer than the other chapters, it's still short, but I hope you like it anyway.

Chapter 7. Gathering.

Thomas didn't have to look behind him to know that people were staring. He was afraid of what he would see if he did look. It could have been anything from sympathy to anger, maybe both.

Thomas forced himself not to turn around, instead, he looked forward, where Rat Man stood. As his beady eyes studied the three of them it occurred to Thomas that the whole thing might have been planned, set up to get reactions and collect brain patterns.

They were still being used, treated like nothing more than test subjects. It made Thomas' blood boil with rage, but he forced himself to stay calm. They didn't need to create more of a scene than they already had.

Newt and Minho were back in their places. Newt was wiping at the tears that had formed in his eyes. Minho, however, did not seem to care about the fact that his eyes were red and puffy or that his face glistened with his own tears. He glared at the rat man with a hatred that was so intense it was scary.

Thomas was seriously starting to doubt that Minho would cooperate with WICKED.

Rat Man opened his mouth to speak, and for a second Thomas thought he was going to call Minho out on his glaring, but instead he said: "Now, do you have any questions?"

That's when the chaos started.

Dozens of questions were shouted at the same time, making it impossible to hear what the questions were.

Thomas didn't join in the shouting, he just watched in amusement as Rat Man tried (and failed) to regain control of the situation. He kept yelling at them to calm down, and they kept ignoring him, which was easy to do since he was barely even heard over the voices of the thirty or so teenagers.

Thomas sensed movement from next to him and saw to his surprise that Newt was standing up.

It took the others less than ten seconds to quiet down, which was impressing, but not surprising, he'd been the second-in-command back in the glade, after all. Even the girls from group B respected him.

Rat Man was looking at him sourly, as if he was jealous of Newt for getting more respect than him.

Once the room was completely silent, Newt asked his question.

"How did you do it?" He asked in a calm voice, "how did you make me go insane?"

Thomas realized that he hadn't thought about that, but now he was curious.

Rat Man looked excited, as if making people go insane was one of his favorite topics.

"That is a good question, it was one of the most complicated variables to perfect, that's part of the reason why your third trial lasted so long," Rat man explained, "While you didn't actually go insane, we imitated what it would feel like to make you think it was happening. We controlled your actions and manipulated your thoughts to make you feel like you were losing control of yourself."

"So you were just bloody controlling me?" Newt said, his calmness somewhat faltering.

"Yes, mostly. we were controlling you during all of your conversations with the other sub- um… I mean participants, but we left you alone for some time to see how you would react. I must say, I'm impressed that your mind didn't completely shatter, though that might have provided even better brain patterns…" Rat Man trailed off as if he'd gotten lost in thought at that last part, which would have worried Thomas if it wasn't for the fact that he was already worried.

He couldn't believe that someone could actually do something so cruel to another human being. This was one of the worst things WICKED had done, and there was no doubt that they could (and would) do even worse.

Thomas wondered if the people at WICKED felt any kind of remorse for what they had done to them.

maybe this new world of sun flares and cranks hardened people until they had no emotions left, or maybe they were simply desperate enough to ignore the torture they put teenagers through.

Maybe WICKED had been good once, just a bunch of hopeful scientists trying to help the human race, until they realized it wouldn't be that easy.

A lack of hope could change people, Thomas had learned that from the maze, he recalled how Alby had given up after the changing. He hadn't known the older boy for long before it had happened, but even he could feel the change. Newt and Minho would probably agree if he asked them about it.

Thomas sighed unhappily, he knew there was no point in dwelling on things like that, at least not now, because now was his best shot at getting a hang of their situation, take in as much information as possible and use his supposed high intelligence to figure out what to do next.

Thomas actually tried to listen after that, but he had to fight the urge to close his eyes and sleep. It had not been a good idea to get the rat man started on his science stuff, he kept going on and on about how they had scanned the brains on cranks to be able to copy how it would be like to have the flare, and how they had worked for days to perfect the method of controlling people's thoughts through a simulation.

In another situation, the information might have been interesting, but Rat Man was extremely boring to listen to, and he sounded like he was just rambling. He didn't explain anything in a way that could benefit them, he didn't even explain enough to make it possible to understand what he meant.

The two groups sat in various stages of boredom. everyone except Aris, who was listening intently. Thomas hoped he would be on their side, if they knew how they could be controlled in the simulation, they might be able to figure out how to stop WICKED from controlling them later (They may have had removed the controlling devices in the simulation, but Thomas doubted that still applied), but he couldn't be sure that Aris wouldn't side with WICKED. He would have to make a careful approach, so as to not give away anything important.

He looked at his friends to see if they were listening. It looked like Minho was asleep, though thankfully he didn't snore like he usually did. Newt, who was sitting again, was twirling a strand of hair between his fingers in an agitated manner. He glanced at Thomas for a brief moment, and Thomas could see the fear in his eyes before he looked away. That did it.

"Excuse me, Ra- Janson!" Thomas called out, narrowly avoiding the fitting, though insulting, nickname.

Rat Man stopped mid-sentence to look at Thomas in annoyance.

"Yes?" He responded.

"What you're saying is really interesting," Thomas lied, "but weren't you supposed to answer our questions?"

Rat Man seemed to be contemplating wether to point out that he _was_ answering a question and continuing, or keep going with the other questions. luckily he chose the latter option.

"Very well. did you have a question, Thomas?"

"Yes, when will the cure be ready?"

That got everyone's attention. They wanted to know if their suffering had made a difference, if it was all over, (though that last part was likely just wishful thinking). Newt nudged Minho with his elbow, and he startled awake.

Rat Man took a pause before speaking.

"Well, as you know by now, we are close to finding a cure. We are getting closer by the day, and with your continued co-operation-"

"Stop saying that!" Interrupted Teresa, to Thomas' surprise. "You have said that so many times already, you can't just expect us to help you when we don't even trust you. You won't even tell us what's going on!" She ranted.

Thomas felt stunned. Teresa was the last person he'd expected to say something like that. He knew that she had helped build the maze and create the variables along with him. She hadn't seemed to be against WICKED as much as the others. Now after the simulation, she seemed to have realized just how rotten WICKED was.

"I'm afraid your ignorance was necessary for the variables to work," said Rat Man, whose smile was now so forced it looked painful, "besides, you wouldn't understand it if we told you. You should be more grateful for your limited knowledge of the happenings in the world, but as I said, with your help, we can restore it to what it used to be."

Thomas, unsatisfied with the answer, asked: "What does 'close' mean? A week? A month? Ten years?" It felt good to finally get the frustration out of his system, and it was a fair question.

"We have something planned for you all in a few days, I am positive we will be done within a month after that," Rat Man responded. Thomas felt annoyed. Not only was WICKED throwing them into another trial, but they would have to wait a _month_ for the cure, and that was most likely in a best-case scenario.

Pandemonium broke out once again.

"Okay, that's enough for today. If you have more questions you can ask them at a later time!" Shouted a guard. then the doors were opened and they were being herded out of the room. The talking changed to whispers as the two groups were led through the corridors of the WICKED complex. At one point group B, along with Teresa, and group A, along with Aris, were led in different directions, and Thomas didn't see or hear the other group after that.

They stopped in front of a big door and the guard in the lead took out a card, which he swiped against a panel on the wall. The door opened with a slight creak and they went inside.

The room was large and had a few sets of bunkbeds along the sides.

They were o obviously supposed to regain their energy for what was coming, but Thomas doubted that anyone would be able to sleep now.

After the door was shut and they were alone, Minho went straight to the corner closest to them and ripped something off the wall.

"Camera," he announced, holding up the now broken device for them to see.

"Now, let's have a gathering," he said.

Everyone except Thomas, Newt and Minho squeezed together on the lower bunks of two of the bunkbeds.

Newt and Minho moved one of the other bunks to stand in front of the group.

Minho climbed easily to the top bunk without using the ladder and sat there.

Thomas rolled his eyes as he joined Newt on the lower bunk.

He knew that there was surely another camera, or at least a listening device in the room, they would have to be careful about what they said. Thomas would try to convince the others to help WICKED without revealing to whoever was overhearing them that he was also plotting to take them down.

"So what's the plan?" Asked frypan.

"I think we should help WICKED, they _are_ trying to save the human race, after all," Aris said, somewhat nervously.

Most of the Gladers looked at him in outrage, but Thomas spoke before anyone had time to protest.

"He's right, we need the cure," he said.

Aris looked at him in relief, the others in varying states of betrayal.

"They're just gonna keep throwing variables at us until we die!" Frypan protested.

"We'll make a deal with them," Thomas explained, "they tell us what's going on and promise not to kill anyone, then we help them create the cure."

"Why do you care so much about the cure all of a sudden?" Gally demanded.

"You all saw what happened without it on that video, we can't let that happen again," Thomas said.

Everyone looked at Newt.

"It's okay," Newt said, "you don't have to do it if you don't want to. If you want to escape I'll help you."

"Slim it Newt," said Minho from above them, "stop being all heroic. I'm in, and if these shanks don't realize that we'll all do something stupid and die without you to stop us from acting completely on our impulses they must have griever-slime for brains."

Thomas waited nervously to see how the Gladers would react.

"Okay, fine," said a boy who Thomas didn't know the name of, "let's say we try what you said, how do we know they'll accept our deal?"

"I'll go talk to Rat Man tomorrow. I'll tell him we refuse to help unless they agree to our deal," Thomas promised. "Good that?" He added, hoping the Glader slang would remind them that they were all part of the same group, that they were on the same side.

"Good that," Frypan said, sighing, and the others were nodding, to Thomas' relief.

With that, the gathering ended, and after a while they all lay in bed, falling asleep one after one.

Thomas was lying on the lower bunk of the bunk bed he shared with Gally. Newt and Minho were on the opposite side of the room, both fast asleep, and seeing them so peaceful made Thomas feel like he was finally safe. He knew that he had a long day in front of him, but he let go of the thought of facing Rat Man again and fell asleep.


	8. Nightmare

_Author's note:_

 _So, I managed to update the story within a week. yay._

 _and also, I noticed that it's been three months since I posted the first chapter, which I think is kind of cool._

 _anyway, here's chapter 8, enjoy._

Chapter 8. Nightmare.

Thomas wasn't a stranger to nightmares. He usually dreaded falling asleep, because most nights he would be plagued by his memories. As much as he expected what he would see, there was no way to prepare.

The safety he'd felt when falling asleep was completely gone as Thomas found himself back in the Glade

He willed himself to wake up, but instead, he started walking. He didn't know why he just did. It was as if someone was controlling his body.

As he walked he saw bodies. They were everywhere, covered in blood in a way that made them unidentifiable.

The Glade was completely silent, Thomas couldn't even hear the sound of his own footsteps. He wondered if this was what it felt like to be deaf.

Suddenly he bumped into something, though he was sure it hadn't been there moments before. He looked up with a sense of dread, a feeling which intensified as he found himself staring into a pair of eyes. The dark eyes had the unfocused stare of a dead person.

Thomas tried not to scream, but a small whimper escaped him as he tried to back away.

He felt something on his arm, a hand. It was cold but firm, and it held Thomas like a shackle made of ice.

He tried to yank his arm away, but the grip only tightened. That, combined with the cold, made Thomas' arm feel numb, and he could feel it spread through the rest of him.

He stood like a statue, frozen with cold and fear, and for some reason, guilt.

He was still looking into the person's eyes, but he managed to pry his gaze away enough to study the rest of the face.

He registered dark skin and hard features, and with a start, he realized who he was looking at. Alby.

His face held no expression and looked just as dead as his eyes. The only thing indicating life was the fact that he was holding Thomas' arm, and of course, he was standing up.

Then he opened his mouth to speak.

"Why did you let me do it, Thomas?" Alby asked, his voice monotone, his eyes still lifeless.

"W-what?" Thomas stammered, though he knew perfectly well what Alby meant.

"You could have stopped it," Alby continued, his voice still not giving away any emotions.

"N-no," was all Thomas managed to get out. He wanted to explain that there was no time, that he'd realized too late what was happening when Alby had sacrificed himself to the grievers.

"It's your fault," Alby told him.

Was it? Could he have stopped it? Part of Thomas knew that the answer was no, but there was something with Alby's voice that tried to convince him that he was telling the truth, and he believed Alby for just a moment.

"YOUR FAULT!" Alby repeated, significantly louder. It was unnerving how his voice was still emotionless, even as he shouted.

Then cuts appeared all over Alby's face as if the grievers were tearing him apart once more. Except there were no grievers this time. Blood started flooding down his face, which would have soaked his clothes had it not been for the slashes on the rest of his body that had already turned the material crimson.

Thomas' arm was drenched too. He wanted to get rid of the blood, he would have done anything to make the warm wetness go away, but he was still unable to get rid of Alby's grip.

"My blood is on your hands," Alby said, more blood spilling out of his mouth as he spoke.

Thomas wanted to scream. He would have if it wasn't for the lump forming in his throat

He thought the lump was caused by the fear and guilt he was feeling, but he realized that it wasn't that as it got bigger and bigger. He couldn't breathe, he coughed and clawed at his throat with his free hand. To his relief, the coughing worked, but the relief was exchanged with pure terror as dark blood streamed from his mouth.

He could feel more blood coming and he was choking again. He doubled over and coughed and spat with a feeling of sheer desperation.

He stood like that for what felt like forever, sure he was going to die, then Alby started shaking his arm for some reason, though he could barely feel it. It felt so distant. Actually, everything was feeling distant. His vision started turning dark.

He couldn't see anything. He wasn't coughing up any more blood. He could only feel one thing, someone shaking his arm.

He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again he was almost blinded by fluorescent light. He blinked a few times to make his eyes adjust to the brightness. As he did so, he realized that he had been dreaming, though he still felt horrified, and he was drenched in sweat.

Not until he could see again did he notice that someone was leaning over him. He realized quickly that it was Newt. He must've been the one who shook him awake.

"Are you okay Tommy?" He asked, looking concerned.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Thomas said, his voice hoarse from just waking up.

"Sure you are," Newt said sarcastically, "you were whimpering and thrashing until I woke you up." He was standing normally now, with his arms crossed.

"Just a nightmare," Thomas muttered as he sat up. To his embarrassment, he found that everyone was looking at him.

"Really, it's nothing," he told them while trying to prevent the heat that was rising to his face.

He wondered how long he'd slept. He was feeling relatively rested, despite the nightmare. He moved to check his watch, only to realize that he wasn't wearing it. He didn't remember taking it off either, which probably meant it had been taken. Come to think of it, he didn't recall having it the day before, so maybe he hadn't had a watch at all.

"What time is it?" He asked. It couldn't have been that early, since no one appeared to be sleeping, unless he had accidentally woken them of course.

"Probably around seven in the morning, though we can't be sure, since those shuck-faces didn't bother to put up a clock," Minho informed him.

Thomas wondered if the people at WICKED had made that decision on purpose, to make them all disoriented. It could be 7 am, it could also be 7 pm. He decided it would be best not to dwell on that.

On second thought, maybe he should have dwelled on it. That might have been better than the awkward silence that ensued.

Thomas wasn't sure why he felt embarrassed about having a nightmare, after all, everyone in the room suffered from them too, but he still had to fight a blush from appearing on his face.

"So, what do we do now?" Asked Frypan in an attempt to end the silence. Thomas felt relieved, now he had something to think about other than his dream. He stood up so everyone could see and hear him properly

"We need to find group B, see where they stand in the situation," Thomas said thoughtfully, "do you know anything about that?" He asked Aris. He remembered that Aris had told him that the girls hated him, but he hoped he had some idea.

"I talked to Sonya and Harriet earlier. They're obviously upset about the simulation thing, but they still want to help WICKED," Aris explained.

Thomas hadn't spent much time with group B, but he wasn't surprised by what he heard. He was glad that they weren't making plans for escape, but he would have to talk to them before they could agree to do anything. It wouldn't likely take much convincing to make them give WICKED the same deal. Hopefully, he'd get to talk to them soon. After all, it would be harder to get WICKED to accept their deal if the other group was already co-operating without conditions.

"Oh, and we need to find Brenda, too," Thomas added as an afterthought.

"Why?" Newt asked.

"What do you mean 'why'?"

"I mean, how do we know if we can trust her? it wouldn't be the first time she's tricked us."

"She didn't _want_ to trick us," Thomas protested.

"Well, she did it anyway, and if she was just as clueless as us, then why isn't she here with us?" Newt snapped.

Thomas wanted to protest, but he couldn't find a good answer. why _was_ she somewhere else? He couldn't imagine her going behind their backs, but the Gladers were not a very trusting group.

"That's right," Newt said, "you only trust her because you have a crush on her."

Thomas took a step back in shock, his face a dark shade of red. He wanted to say that he didn't trust her because of some crush, he also wanted to deny said crush. Unfortunately, the only sound he made was some incoherent stuttering.

He expected Newt to use that as proof that he'd been correct, but instead, he put his face in his hands.

"Sorry, Tommy," he said, voice somewhat muffled by his hands, "I didn't mean that."

"It's okay, I know you didn't mean it," Thomas assured him. He was relieved that it was over, and he _did_ know Newt hadn't meant it, but the words still stung. The worst part was that there must've been some kind of truth in what he'd said, even if the words weren't really his. Did he really think that Thomas trusted Brenda blindly because he liked her? Did the others think that, too? What if they were right? Thomas didn't like her that way, but they were still friends. He liked talking to her, and he trusted her. What if that was a mistake?

He tried not to put too much thought into the poisonous words of the flare. If it turned out she was truly on their side, mistrusting her could ruin their friendship.

He knew he would have to get used to arguments like this if they didn't find the cure soon. It was only a matter of time before it would spiral out of control.

Thomas felt exhausted all of a sudden. He considered sitting down on his bunk bed again, and possibly take a nap, but before he could, the door opened.

"Morning kids," said a tall guard with a voice that was more cheerful than you'd expect from someone that looked so intimidating, "it's breakfast time, and as a warm-up for today, you have to find the cafeteria by yourselves."


	9. Encounter

Chapter 9.

A surge of annoyance filled Thomas as he processed the information. The words 'warm up' meant something would happen, probably another variable. WICKED couldn't even wait 24 hours before they threw the gladers into another deadly situation. Thomas was honestly not surprised.

"good luck, kids" the guard said. Then he turned around and walked out the door. That was it, no map, no clues, nothing. Thomas wondered if they could have followed the guard, he might be headed for the cafeteria if they were lucky, but by the time Thomas thought of that the guard was long gone.

He sighed, then turned to face his friends.

"What do we do now?" He asked.

"aren't you the one making plans around here?" Minho wondered.

"aren't you the one who ran around in a maze for two years?" Thomas replied.

"Fair enough" Minho said with a shrug. "well, we shouldn't get too divided, there may not be grievers here, but I still don't think anyone should risk going of on their own, I mean, who knows what's in this place? But if we go as one group it'll take longer time" his voice had turned more serious as he spoke, and it made him sound like a true keeper of the runners.

"two groups" Minho decided.

"that's what makes the most sense. I'll take one group, Newt takes the other, we were both runners, so we know what we're doing. Right Newt?" He looked at Newt, who gave a nod in agreement.

"good. Thomas, can you and Aris still do the telepathy thing?"

'the telepathy thing'. Thomas had forgotten about it completely. He could have tried talking to Teresa earlier, told her about his plan. He would have to try contacting her as soon as possible, but now was not the time.

" _can you hear me_?" He asked in his mind. It was directed at Aris, but he wanted Teresa to hear him too. " _yeah"_ Aris replied. Thomas felt a bit disappointed that it hadn't been Teresa who'd answered, but at least now he knew it worked.

"It still works" he told Minho.

"that is still seriously freaky, but at least we have a means of communication between both groups. Now, let's get going".

"good that" Thomas said. Then the gladers stepped out into the maze that was WICKED's facility.

Soon the corridor parted. There were three options. Continue forward, go left, or go right. They had come from the corridor on the right the day before, and none of them could remember seeing a cafeteria. It could have been there anyway, but they decided to explore the other corridors first.

Minho went into the left corridor, followed by Aris, Frypan and two other gladers that Thomas didn't know. Newt led the way forward with Thomas at his side, the remaining gladers followed a few paces behind them.

As they walked through the corridor they passed a few doors, though all of them were locked. there weren't any side-corridors, and the corridor they walked through seemed to be endless. Occasionally it would turn in a random direction, and after a while Thomas didn't even know which direction they'd come from. It was scary, even though they could just turn around and walk back, they weren't actually lost, it just felt like it.

Thomas wanted to talk to someone, not about anything in particular, just to pass the time, but the only one who didn't look exhausted was Newt, and Thomas couldn't talk to him, because he had to stay focused on where they were going, even if they were just walking through the same corridor.

" _are you there?"_ He asked mentally.

 _"_ _Did you find anything?"_ Replied a voice. The wrong voice.

 _"_ _No, I wasn't talking to you"_ Thomas explained in annoyance.

 _"_ _If you're trying to talk to Teresa, just know that I've tried that a dozen times already without her responding"_ Aris said.

Thomas ignored him.

 _"_ _Teresa!"_ Thomas called out, focusing so hard his head hurt.

No response.

He hoped it was just temporary, that they wouldn't separate Teresa from him again. Hopefully their power had just been shut of so they couldn't help each other with the newest challenge, assuming group B had to do the same thing.

"Hey, guys!" Called a glader from behind them, startling Thomas.

"What is it, Alex?" Asked Newt.

"this door is unlocked" Alex said, opening the door on his right to demonstrate.

Thomas shoved past the other boys to get a better look, but there wasn't much to see, since whatever was on the other side was shrouded in darkness.

By that time, Newt had made his way to the opening. He shoved Thomas lightly and Thomas stepped out of the way.

"should we go inside?" Thomas asked him.

Newt squinted in an attempt to see what was inside, but he quickly gave up.

"well, we don't know what could be in there" he said thoughtfully. "I'll go inside and try to find a light switch".

"I'm going with you" Thomas said immediately.

"No, you're staying here" Newt said.

"and that's an order" he added before disappearing into the darkness.

Thomas waited anxiously for Newt to return. He had only the sound of faint footsteps to reassure him that nothing had happened. He wasn't sure about what exactly he thought would happen, he knew it was probably just a normal, empty room, but he'd learned to expect the worst.

After a few minutes of waiting, there was a small 'click' and the room before him lit up.

Thomas released a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding and entered the room.

The large room looked like it was made for meetings, with about two dozen chairs placed around an oval table. There weren't any other exits, unless they were hidden.

He saw Newt standing at the opposite side of the table, but he didn't notice Thomas, he appeared to be studying something on the floor.

Thomas was about to go over to him and see what it was, but before he could do so, a high-pitched, almost inhuman scream rang out from Newt's direction.

Then something launched itself at his friend. A crank. It must've been what Newt had been looking at.

"Run! There's a crank!" He shouted at the other gladers.

The former person gave another shriek as Newt punched it in an attempt to get it off of him, but the crank was still on top of him. It didn't look like it had a weapon, but that didn't make it any less dangerous.

Thomas was about to rush over to help, but someone beat him to it, shoving him to the side and running past him. It was Gally, he realised, as the other boy jumped over the table and pulled the crank off of Newt.

The thing gave an animalistic roar as it turned on him, swiping at him with it's claw-like nails.

Gally tried his best to block the attacks, but his best wasn't enough. The crank scratched his left cheek, leaving two diagonal lines that immediately filled with blood. He instinctively put his hand against the wound, and for the moment he was distracted, the crank grabbed him and slammed him hard against the wall. Then it took hold of his neck and started squeezing.

Gally made choking noises as he tried to get the hands away, but the crank only pressed harder. Its nails dug into Gally's skin and small trickles of blood ran down his neck.

Thomas suddenly realised that he had just stood there the whole time being useless. He climbed over the table (because jumping over it was a lot harder than it looked), and by the time he was there, Newt was on his feet. Thomas watched as he grabbed a chair and slammed it into the crank's head. The crank let go of Gally as it fell to the floor.

Gally stumbled, but managed to steady himself in time, drawing in a huge breath as he did so. While he was trying to regain a normal respiratory rate, the crank, which Thomas thought had been unconscious, spoke, of all things.

"liars, liars, liars" it whispered like a chant "liars, all liars". They backed away from it, but it didn't even seem to notice them anymore.

"said they were finding the cure, they were going to take away the things in my head. they lied, no cure, only stupid telepathy, no cure for me" it began to giggle, a sound of complete lunacy.

"come on, we should leave while we can" Newt said.

With that they made their way to the door, going around the table instead of over it this time. Gally was a little unsteady from the recent lack of oxygen, but Newt supported him. Thomas walked behind them, feeling ashamed of himself for not doing anything during the fight. If something had happened, it would have been his fault, he knew that Newt didn't blame him, there was no telling with Gally, but he probably didn't either. He decided to let it go for the moment, he needed his mind for something else.

 _"_ _Aris!"_ he called mentally.

 _"_ _ow, you don't have to shout like that"_ Aris complained

 _"_ _right, sorry, but we just got attacked by a crank, I'd rather not stay over here, please tell me you found that shucking cafeteria"._ Thomas said.

 _"_ _a crank? Never mind, we'll talk about that later. I was actually about to contact you, I'm pretty sure we found it"_ Aris told him.

 _"_ _What do you mean by 'pretty sure'?"_ Thomas asked sceptically.

 _"_ _there's sounds, like voices and stuff, hang on, it should be right behind this corner… yeah, we found it. We'll get back to where we parted ways, see you there"_

Thomas sighed in relief.

"I talked to Aris, the others found the cafeteria, now we just have to go back" Thomas said to Newt.

"finally some good news" Newt said, "we faster we get out of here the better, who knows when that crank'll come chasing after us".

Thomas looked back at the crank, which was still giggling and muttering to itself. He thought of what it had said. 'no cure, only stupid telepathy', what was that supposed to mean? He understood the part about there being no cure, but telepathy? Were WICKED using some brain patterns that had to do with telepathy? Thomas supposed he shouldn't listen to the words of a demented crank that was currently lying on the floor giggling, but there was something about it, something Thomas couldn't explain, but there would be time for suspiciousness later.

Thomas expected the other two gladers to be waiting outside, but they were nowhere to be found. They must've done as Newt had said and ran.

"we should start running now if we want to catch up to the others" Newt said "do you feel up for that, Gally?" He asked.

"yeah, I'm fine" Gally assured him. It was an obvious lie, the small wounds on his throat had stopped bleeding, but the scratches on his cheek hadn't. He held his sleeve against them, but it was already stained red. He was clearly in pain, but neither Thomas or Newt argued, the crank's mutterings had grown louder, and Gally if wanted to run, then there was no point in not doing so.

When they got back to the others, Minho's group was already waiting for them.

"what happened to you?!" Minho asked in alarm.

"we'll explain, but we should get going first, we could be followed for all we know." Newt said.

Minho looked confused but decided not to argue, he let Frypan take the lead so he could walk with Thomas and Newt.

They took turns explaining what had happened, and by the end of the story Minho was frowning.

"do you think they put it there on purpose?" Minho asked.

Thomas hadn't thought of that, but it made sense, why else would there just happen to be a crank behind the one door that wasn't looked?

"Probably" Newt responded "I don't think they want to hurt us at the moment, they probably just wanted to scare us".

"Probably" Minho agreed "am I the only one who's getting really tired of their mind games? I mean, they just keep doing it over and over, for all we know this might not be real, you could be robots programmed to act like humans, I'm just so sick of not knowing, you know what I mean?"

"yeah, you're definitely not alone on that" Thomas said, thinking back on when WICKED made him think Teresa had betrayed him back in the scorch.

"well, we're here" Minho said, pointing ahead unnecessarily.

And there it was, the cafeteria that they'd had to go through a near-death experience in the search of.

'The food better be worth it' Thomas thought as they entered.


	10. Revelation

_Authors note:_ _Wow, I've written ten chapters already. Thanks so much to everyone who reviewed the story, it's really encouraging. Special thanks to the reviewer who mentioned that there were some issues with the grammar, I didn't realize until then that I didn't know much about the grammar around dialogue, I looked it up and I hope I got it right. I don't know if I'm missing something else, so please tell me if I am, you can either write it in a review or send a DM to me on instagram (miranda_the_fangirl)._ _Now, please enjoy chapter 10!_

CHAPTER 10!

As it turned out, the food was definitely not worth it.

Sure, he was hungry, but the sandwiches and apples did not look very appealing. In fact, he could see something resembling mold on the bread. the apples were wrinkled and some looked like they had started to rot.

He wondered if WICKED's food supplies had been compromised somehow, but Thomas had more important things to think of at the moment. After all, he was on a mission.

He scanned the room in search for Harriet and Sonya, since they seemed to be the leaders of group B. He hoped Teresa was with them, they really had some catching up to do, even though he knew he knew it would have to wait for a while longer.

"There," said Minho from next to him. When Thomas turned to look at him, he saw that Minho was pointing to a table in the corner. The table was mostly obscured by a bunch of crates that were stacked almost like a wall, Thomas couldn't see anyone at the table, but when he moved closer to where Minho was standing he could clearly see the girls.

All of them couldn't very well go over there, it would draw attention. they were obviously being watched constantly all the time, but it might not feel like they were, and that was all they could do really. Besides, it would be better to have a conversation between the leaders, without a bunch of spectators interrupting.

"How about you guys find a table somewhere?" Newt suggested, "we'll find you later."

"Good that," Frypan said, and everyone except Thomas, Newt and Minho went to find a table.

The trio made their way to the corner where Sonya and Harriet sat.

"Good, I really need to talk to you," Sonya said when she spotted them. She looked past Thomas, and he realised she was looking at Newt. "that's great, we wanted to speak to you too," Newt replied.

"But I thought you didn't get your memories back," Sonya said, looking confused.

"We didn't," Minho added helpfully, "but why does that matter?"

"I don't think we're talking about the same thing here" said Harriet, clearing up some of the confusion.

"Well, what _are_ you talking about then?" Minho demanded.

"When we got our memories back, well, we didn't get all of it back, I don't think so anyway," Sonya began. Thomas wondered where she was going with this.

"One of the few things I can remember clearly is that- that I'm your sister, Newt."

Thomas had thought nothing could surprise him anymore, but he had been wrong.

When the initial shock had settled down, Thomas could see how it actually made sense.

They did look similar. Sonya's hair had more of a reddish tint, but she shared Newt's eyes and several of his facial features.

When Thomas had heard her speak he had detected a faint accent. it wasn't as obvious as Newt's, but it was definitely the same. He looked at Newt to see how he handled the information.

Newt was looking at Sonya sceptically. "How do I know that you're not trying to trick me or something?" He asked her.

"Trick you? Why would I do that?" Sonya wondered, looking surprised at the accusation.

Newt shrugged. "it's just that it's stupid to trust people you don't know."

"Well, if you had decided to get your memories back you would have known me," Sonya pointed out. She sounded hurt.

"Sorry, I believe you, it's just- I'm just surprised, that's all," Newt said apologetically, having realised how cold he'd been.

"So, what was it like? You know, before WICKED," Newt asked.

"We used to live with our parents, then WICKED found out I was immune. They came to take me, but our parents fought back. Of course, they didn't stand a chance, when the fighting was over the people from WICKED decided they couldn't leave you there, so they took you too," Sonya's voice was very quiet as she spoke, she understandably looked sad from recalling what had happened.

Thomas wished he could find it surprising that WICKED had killed two people that were just trying to protect their child. It made him wonder how many other parents they had killed to get their test subjects.

Newt gave a small nod, looking like the information had added to the invisible weight on his shoulders.

"When we got here we were separated almost immediately, but you would sneak out at night and visit me as often as you could. I don't remember what my real old name was, but you called me Lizzy," Sonya reminisced, a small smile on her face.

Newt gave a weak smile, looking like he wished he could remember.

Thomas wished they had decided to get their memories back, or at least convinced Newt to do so. Most of the memories obviously held sadness, but the good memories might make up for it. It must've been hard for Sonya too, her own brother couldn't even remember that they were related, Thomas couldn't even begin to imagine what that felt like.

"Sibling reunion aside, we came here because we need to speak to you," Minho said, interrupting the moment.

"Really?" Harriet raised an eyebrow, "about what?"

"We're gonna make this deal with WICKED, it'll probably be easier if you do the same thing," Minho explained.

"Well, tell us about it then," Harriet urged.

"It's simple. We'll only co-operate with WICKED if they tell us what's going on and promise not to kill anyone," Thomas said.

"That sounds good, we're in," Harriet decided.

Thomas was relieved, it _was_ a reasonable thing to do, but he wasn't used to things going the way he'd hoped.

"Hang on, how do we know we can trust him?" Sonya demanded.

Thomas really shouldn't have gotten his hopes up.

"Why shouldn't we trust him?" Harriet asked.

"He killed my brother! He helped build the maze! Why _should_ we trust him?" Sonya said, crossing her arms stubbornly.

"None of that was his fault and you know that. He was being manipulated by WICKED," Harriet said to Thomas' surprise. He had thought Harriet would side with her friend, but instead she defended Thomas. He could see how that made her a good leader, she could use logic over emotions when making decisions.

"Besides, what could he possibly gain from tricking us about this?" Harriet continued.

Sonya shrugged, looking uncertain.

"Seeing as I'm the leader and you're only second-in-command, it doesn't really matter what you think about this, but I'd rather have you on my side, so, same fire?" Harriet said.

"Same fire," Sonya repeated with only slight reluctance.

"Same fire?" Minho asked.

"It's just something we came up with in the maze," Harriet explained, "it was cold in there, so we lit fires to keep warm, 'same fire' means 'we're on the same side', because we would't share a fire if we weren't on the same side,"

"So, basically it means 'same side'?" Minho asked.

"Yeah, but it's not like you didn't create your own slang," Sonya said defensively, "besides, being in a maze for two years is boring,"

"Good that," Minho agreed.

None of them seemed to have anything more to say after that, they just stood there quietly for a while.

"Maybe we should go," Newt suggested, breaking the silence. The others nodded their agreement, but Thomas suddenly remembered something.

"Wait!" he exclaimed, a bit to loudly.

Newt and Minho stopped in their tracks to stare at him.

"What?" Harriet asked.

"Teresa. She was with you yesterday, do you know where she is now?" Thomas wondered.

"She _was_ with us until this morning, the guard who opened the door told her to come with him, and she did," Sonya explained.

"Well that's just great," Thomas muttered, "I guess I'll have to make seeing her part of the deal then."

"We can add things to the deal now?" Harriet asked, though the glint in her eyes told Thomas that she wasn't being serious.

"If we're done with the questions I think you should get going," Sonya said, "Aris has been staring at us for at least three minutes now, I think he wants to talk to us."

Thomas looked behind him and saw through a large gap between two crates that Aris was, indeed, staring at them, though when he noticed them staring back he looked away.

"I thought you didn't like him," Thomas said, remembering Aris telling him that his group hated him.

"We didn't at first," Sonya admitted, "but he kind of grew on us."

"See you later then," Minho said, then the three of them left to find their friends.

The two groups weren't alone in the cafeteria, a whole bunch of WICKED-employees were there too, but the other gladers were easy to find. They had seen where Aris had been sitting for one thing, but they could also hear Frypan complain about the food loud enough to be heard over everyone in that half of the room.

They made a detour for the table with all the food on it and tried to pick something that wasn't moldy, then they made their way over to the other gladers.

Frypan didn't notice them and continued his ranting until one of the others elbowed him.

"What was that for?" he demanded.

The other guy responded by pointing at Thomas, Newt and Minho. Frypan turned around. "Oh, hey. How'd it go?" he asked, looking embarrassed.

"They agreed to the deal," Newt informed, "and as it turns out, I have a sister."

"Is it Sonya from group B?" Frypan guessed.

"How'd you know that? Did she tell you?" Newt asked.

"No, but she didn't need to, I spent some time with her in the simulation. When she gets really mad she starts talking in a very familiar accent, plus you two look pretty similar," Frypan explained.

"When did you become so observant?" Minho wondered, sitting down on the chair next to him.

"I've always been this observant. I'm an observant guy. In fact, I am so observant that I can tell this food is at last a month old," Frypan said.

"You don't need to be observant to notice that," Thomas muttered as he sat down on a chair between Newt and Gally. He saw that Gally wasn't bleeding anymore, but there was dried blood all over his face. Thomas felt guilty for not helping in the fight against the crank.

"I'm sorry, Gally," Thomas said.

"Huh?" was Gally's response. He looked at Thomas.

"Is this about the fight with the griever?" Gally asked.

"Yeah, I just stood there, I should have helped. I'm sorry," Thomas apologised.

"It's okay, Greenie. I mean, you were pretty useless, but you'll learn," Gally said, then he patted Thomas on the back.

Thomas only felt slightly better. Gally didn't blame him for it, which was a relief, but Thomas still felt ashamed of himself.

He took bite of his sandwich and tried not to gag, the thing tasted even worse than it looked. The bread was stale and tasted like dust, whatever was inside of it had gone bad long ago.

He knew that bad food was better than no food (unless the bad food killed him), so he tried his best to continue eating it, resisting the urge to throw up.

"Ahem," Thomas heard from behind. He spun around to see a guard, the same guard he'd seen earlier in the morning.

"What do _you_ want?" Thomas asked him, perfectly aware of how whiny he sounded.

"A.D Janson would like to speak to you, Thomas. And I've also been asked to escort Gally and Newt to the medics," The guard said.

Thomas was surprised, not about Rat man wanting to talk to him, but about why Newt needed to go to the medics.

"What do they want with Newt?" Minho asked suspiciously.

"Are you aware of his condition?" the guard asked, sounding somewhat sympathetic.

"Yes, but how do we know you're not just trying to get rid of him or something because he's not immune?" Minho demanded.

Thomas guessed Minho had a point. of course, Gally would be there, but he knew that Minho didn't trust him in the slightest.

The guard sighed. "I assure you we will do no such thing, though I suppose you don't care much for assurances by people working here."

"Correct," Minho responded.

"Would you feel better about it if I let you come along?" the guard asked.

Minho gave a nod, then he stood up.

"Lead the way," he said.

"In a moment," the guard promised, "we need Harriet from group B too."

"Thomas!" Frypan called before they left, "tell Rat man that the food sucks and I should get to cook instead!" Thomas rolled his eyes, but he _did_ miss Frypan's cooking.

Then Thomas, Newt, Minho and Gally followed the guard to where Harriet and Sonya were sitting.

Thomas gestured for Harriet to come. She said something Thomas couldn't hear to Sonya, then she was on her way.

"I didn't know we were supposed to bring half the group," Harriet remarked.

Thomas just rolled his eyes at her.

They walked the rest of the way in silence. Thomas was focusing on making a mental map of the corridors they walked through so he wouldn't get lost on the way back.

The guard stopped outside a narrow hallway that held only one door at the end of it. He remembered Rat man's office from the simulation, and it was somewhere else, though he supposed the Rat man could have just gotten a new one.

"Just knock on the door," the guard instructed before continuing to walk through the corridor they were currently in.

"Wish me luck," Thomas said to his friends.

"Punch Rat man in the face for me," Minho said.

"Do _not_ punch Rat man in the face," Newt corrected, "good luck, Tommy."

Gally gave Thomas a nod, then the three of them rushed away to catch up with the guard.

"Just remember to stay calm. he'll probably try to upset you, so don't let him," Harriet said. "I'll keep that in mind," Thomas promised.

Then they walked through the hallway until they were in front of the door. Thomas made to knock, but hesitated, so Harriet moved past him and knocked on it herself. They backed away, waited a few seconds, then the door opened.


	11. agreement

CHAPTER 11.

The door made a creaking sound as it opened. It moved at a slow pace, not stopping until it hit the wall. Thomas expected to see someone standing in front of the opening, Rat man, or maybe a guard. Therefore he was surprised to see no one. The door must have been mechanical or something, undoubtedly controlled by Rat man.

Harriet walked inside first, her head held high in a confident manner. Thomas went after her, trying to copy her confidence.

The room wasn't small, but it wasn't large either, the grey walls were mostly covered by shelves that were overstuffed with papers and files. More papers had been taped to the walls, mostly diagrams and pictures of what were most likely brains from infected people.

Rat man was sitting at a large desk made out of dark wood. The desk was placed in the lower right corner, making it hard to spot from outside.

Rat man himself looked as smug as ever. He gestured at two chairs that had been conveniently placed in front of the desk. Harriet sat down in the left chair, Thomas took the right.

"You wanted to see us," Harriet reminded Rat man when he didn't say anything.

"That is correct," Rat man said, "the brain patterns we've gathered are promising, but we will need a few more to create a cure. As you most likely suspected, we still need your help."

Thomas relaxed, he hadn't noticed how nervous he'd been. He'd been anticipating that something would go wrong, that it would turn out WICKED didn't need them to cooperate, the plan would be ruined and they wouldn't have any kind of leverage.

Of course, he hadn't announced the deal yet, it could still go wrong, but so far so good.

"We have two conditions, accept them and we'll help you," Thomas said. He waited for an agonising moment as Rat man seemed to ponder it.

"Very well, what do you want?" Rat man asked him.

"We want information, we want the truth about what's actually going on in the world, and how close to a cure you actually are, we won't help you unless we know what're doing," Thomas said, speaking fast so he wouldn't get interrupted.

He expected Rat man to look angry, or at least annoyed, but his expression remained the same.

"Of course," Rat man said, "we've already decided to stop hiding things from you, we even allowed you to roam freely in the building this morning, and we will let you walk around as you please in the future. Unfortunately we can't tell tell you much about your next trial, since that will affect your reactions, but other than that you're free to ask us about anything."

Thomas was relieved that Rat man agreed, but he didn't know if they would actually be told the truth. He also hadn't expected that they would be allowed to just walk around freely in the WICKED-complex, which would've been a nice surprise if it hadn't been for the run-in with a crank earlier. He wondered if it had been put there on purpose, to send some kind of message, scare them of. But he would still take the opportunity to explore the building and maybe find some answers.

"Speaking of the next trial," Harriet said, "our second condition is that no one dies."

This made Rat man's smile falter.

"We haven't planned for anyone to die in the next trial, but we will allow you to act on your own for most of it, there's no telling what will happen. We can't promise no one gets hurt."

"I _can_ promise you that you won't be getting any help from the gladers if it happens," Thomas said, he doubted it would change the answer if Rat man was telling the truth about them getting to act on their own, but he wanted to make it clear that he was serious, in case Rat man was lying.

"Same goes for the glenners," Harriet added. Thomas didn't recognise the word 'glenners', but he guessed that was the group B version of 'gladers'.

"Fine, we will try our best. Now, do you agree to cooperate?"

Thomas wanted to say that 'try our best' wasn't good enough, but was positive he wouldn't get anywhere. It would be best to just seal the deal before Rat man changed his mind. He just hoped he'd gotten the point across about what would happen if someone died anyway.

"I agree," Thomas said finally.

"Me too, as long as you keep your end of the deal," Harriet said.

"Good, do you have something more to say before you return to your friends?" Rat man wondered.

"Yes, I want to know a few things," Thomas said.

Time to see if Rat man would stick to his promise.

"Go ahead," Rat man replied calmly.

"How do you use brain patterns to make a cure?" Thomas asked. He'd been wondering about that for a long time.

"The brain of an immune person works differently than that from a normal person's," Rat man explained, "an immune may react to something the exact same way as a normal person, but their brains work differently, creating another pattern. It happens because immunes have a substance in their brain, a kind of enzyme that repels the flare. Certain emotions seem to increase the amount of it. but we have not managed to remove any of it to observe or use in any way. We have collected brain patterns, since it's the best way to learn more about how it's produced.

Our hypothesis is that the enzyme will spread to the bloodstream of an immune who is exposed to enough of these certain emotions to produce the enzyme until there's too much of it to stay in just the brain. We should be able to study the enzyme if it's in the blood. It should work as a cure, and we will hopefully be able to find a way to copy it."

Thomas didn't like that answer. There was no guarantee it would work, and if it didn't? What then? Would the trials have been for nothing? and he didn't like the thought of being 'exposed to enough of these certain emotions', he had a feeling those emotions weren't positive ones. He guessed grief was one of the emotions, it made sense, since so many of them had died, but he wasn't sure if it was possible to get any sadder than he'd already been. He

wasn't eager to find out.

"Are you planning on testing that hypothesis in the next trial?" Harriet wondered, "also, what emotions are you talking about?"

"Yes, I'm afraid we are going to put you through some stressful situations to get the cure, but when we succeed there won't be any more trials. Don't worry, it will be worth it, you're saving the human race and even some of your friends. don't you think that makes everything okay?" Rat man responded, though he didn't answer Harriets second question.

"Okay? What you have done to us is not okay. Sure, it's saving the human race, it may be the best solution, but that doesn't make it okay. We'll help you find the cure, I personally don't care about what you do to me, but don't pretend what you're doing is okay," Harriet ranted.

Thomas wondered if Rat man would look guilty or something, but of course he didn't.

The room was silent for a long time, until Thomas deemed it a good time to ask his next question.

"When will the cure be ready if everything goes according to plan?" he wondered.

"Hopefully just a few weeks," Rat man responded, "I assume you're worried about your friend Newt."

"Of course I'm worried, can he even last a few weeks?" Thomas asked, feeling stressed.

"We are doing our best to help him," Rat man assured him, "the virus won't take effect as quickly as it did in the simulation, where we sped up the

process, but it's up to him if he can survive that long."

"Why do you need a few weeks anyway? I mean, if it works, won't the blood be the cure? Can't I just give him some of my blood?" Thomas wondered. He realised that he might not even be the one who succeeded in producing enough of the enzyme to make a cure, but the people at WICKED always talked about him being the final candidate, so he just assumed it.

"You are the one most likely to give us a cure, but you have the blood group AB+, which can only be given to others with the exact same blood group. Unfortunately your friend has a different blood group, and so does most of the world. Because of that, we have to separate the enzyme from the blood, which may take some time, since the enzyme seems to cling to other cells, but it'll be easier to estimate the time once we have something to work with," Rat man explained.

Thomas didn't remember much about blood groups (assuming he'd known much about it before), but he knew that bad things happened if non-compatible blood groups were mixed. He sighed in disappointment.

"Do you have any more questions?" Rat man wondered.

"Where are my friends?" Thomas asked.

Rat man looked confused.

"Which of your friends do you mean?" he wondered.

"Teresa, Brenda, Jorge. I haven't seen Brenda or Jorge since the simulation ended, and apparently you took Teresa away from group B this morning," Thomas clarified.

"You'll see them soon. we have actually arranged a meeting for you and miss Agnes later in the day. As for the other two, they're helping with the preparations for the next trial, it's a lot of work and we don't have a lot of time. However, I will see if there's time for them to come see you before the trial begins, is that good enough for you?" Rat man said.

Thomas gave a nod in agreement, at least there were some good news.

"Are you done with the questions now?" Rat man asked.

"Yes," Thomas answered. Sure, there were more things he wanted to know, but he could ask someone else later. He didn't like being in Rat man's office, the room was too warm and the air felt thick and suffocating. He'd rather be somewhere that had air conditioning.

Thomas felt relieved when Harriet nodded in response to the question.

The two of them got up to leave. Thomas was almost past the door when he remembered that his friends had gone to the medics.

He stopped walking and turned around to face Rat man.

"Where are the medics?" Thomas asked.

"I thought you were done with the questions," Rat man remarked, "why do you want to know that anyway? Are you feeling unwell?"

"My friends are there," Thomas explained.

"I wasn't aware of that. what happened?" Rat man wondered. He didn't sound concerned or even curious. He probably just wanted to be annoying. He had most likely been spying on them through the security cameras that were all over the place and knew exactly what had happened.

"Directions?" Thomas asked.

"Down the corridor, then take the third left turn," Rat man instructed.

"Okay," Thomas said, then he remembered what Frypan had said before he left. "By the way, Frypan wanted me to tell you that the food here sucks and that he should get to cook instead."

This made Rat man look somewhat annoyed.

"You can tell him that he'll get to cook as much as he wants during your next trial."

Then Thomas left the room. Harriet was nowhere to be seen, he supposed she'd gone back to her group.

He didn't have to walk long before he reached the third left turn in the corridor.

The door didn't have a handle. Thomas realised that it must be one of those doors you push open. He pushed at the door carefully, and it turned out he'd been right. The door swung open easily.

Nobody seemed to notice him as he went inside.

He spotted his friends easily in the mostly empty room.

On the other side of the room, Newt and Minho sat next to each other on cot while a woman was telling them something, though they were too far away for Thomas to hear it. Gally was standing nearby, waiting for them. He looked to his side and spotted Thomas. Thomas could see that his wounds had been cleaned. It must have looked worse than it actually was earlier, what with all the blood. Now there were just two red lines on his face that would probably vanish soon.

Gally nodded in greeting, but didn't say anything. Then he went back to watching the others.

Thomas approached the group. No one else noticed him. He could hear what the woman was saying now.

"It slows down your brain process and-"

"No!" Newt interrupted, sounding angry, "I already told you, how am I supposed to do anything if I can't bloody think?"

"What's going on?" Thomas asked.

Newt flinched and turned around.

"Tommy. I didn't notice you, how'd the meeting with Rat man go?"

"Does she want to give you the bliss?" Thomas wondered, ignoring Newt's question. The bliss was the only thing he'd heard of that slowed down brain process. He really hoped they were talking about something else though. He remembered seeing infected people use the bliss in the simulation, they had looked so distant. He didn't want Newt to become a crank, but he didn't want to be unable to interact with him either.

"No," said the woman in an exasperated tone, as if she'd had to explain that many times, "the bliss is addictive and leaves lasting damage on the user's brain. This just slows down the brain process without those side effects. It doesn't take away all ability to think properly either, it's made to settle on the infected parts of the brain. It will make it somewhat harder to use those parts, but that depends on how much of it you take."

Thomas noticed that she was holding a small see-through box that was filled with tiny pills.

"No," Newt said again, "it looks like we're gonna do another trial, I need my mind to be completely clear."

"Come on, Newt. You're not the only one in our group with a brain," Minho said, "besides, if you don't do anything to slow it, you won't be able to think clearly anyway."

Newt sighed. "Fine, but if you come up with some bad plan that gets us all killed I'm gonna get really mad at you," he threatened.

"Deal," Minho said. Then he took the box from the woman and handed it to Newt.

Newt opened it and took out a pill, he studied it suspiciously before putting it in his mouth and swallowing it.

"Can we go now?" Gally asked, sounding bored.

"Yeah, let's go," Newt replied, standing up.

"Wait," the woman said, "you'll probably get tired in a moment, since your brain isn't used to that substance, just so you know. It only happens the first time, so it won't be a problem later."

"Then we better get going," Newt said.

No one argued. They walked out of the room and began the walk back to their room.


	12. Apology

Chapter 12.

"Do you think the others are still in the cafeteria?" Thomas asked his friends as they walked through the corridors of the WICKED-complex.

"Probably, we haven't been gone for that long. Besides, they're probably not gonna go anywhere while they're waiting on us," Minho speculated.

"We should just go get them and then find someplace private, so you can tell us about the meeting," Newt suggested.

"I hope for own your sake that you're not naive enough to think any place we're allowed to go is private" Gally said bitterly.

"I'm not, but I don't think the cafeteria is a good place to discuss anything. I'd rather be somewhere quiet," Newt explained. Then he yawned.

"Are you getting tired?" Thomas asked him.

"No," Newt said, though he didn't sound very sincere.

After that they walked in silence.

They didn't have any trouble finding the right way back, what with having three ex-runners in their small group.

After ten minutes they passed a peculiar set of doors that Thomas had seen on the way to Rat man's office. He estimated they were halfway to the cafeteria.

After five more minutes the pace dropped. At first Thomas didn't notice it, but he realised it as they gradually got slower and slower. He realised soon why it was happening.

It was Newt. He was in the front of the group, leading the way and also steering how fast the others walked.

Minho walked up to him.

"What's wrong?" he wondered.

"Nothing's wrong, just a little tired, that's all," Newt said, "it's probably gonna wear off soon."

It did not wear off soon. They kept walking, Gally in the front this time. Newt and Minho were next to Thomas. Every time Thomas looked at Newt he seemed to get more tired, but he kept a relatively steady pace.

It took twice as long as it should have, but they reached the cafeteria at last.

They stopped outside the room.

"Should I go and get them so you get a head start to the room?" Gally suggested.

"Actually, no," Minho said, "I think we should do this later. Newt looks like he's about to fall asleep, and we need everyone for the discussion. You can go and tell them they can in stay there for a while if they want, we'll have a gathering later."

"I am not about to fall asleep," Newt protested, looking very much like he was about to fall asleep.

"See you later," Gally said, before walking into the cafeteria.

"Let's go," Minho said, "walking to the room will probably take fifteen minutes give or take. Can you stay awake that long?" He looked at Newt.

Newt simply nodded, he must've been too tired to look offended.

"Come on then," Thomas said as he started walking.

Newt made to follow, but he stumbled. Minho caught him before he fell.

"Careful," he said.

After that they started walking. Minho was still holding Newt, in case he stumbled again. Thomas was in front of them.

The next fifteen minutes were uneventful, though by the time they reached their room, Newt was leaning heavily on Minho.

The door was closed, and for a moment Thomas was afraid it would be locked, though when he pulled on the door handle he found to his relief that it wasn't.

Minho put Newt down on the closest bunkbed, though the latter appeared to be asleep already.

Minho turned around to face Thomas.

"We need to talk," he announced.

"About what?" Thomas asked, though he suspected he already knew.

"About what happened in the simulation," Minho clarified, "and how I reacted. I shouldn't have punched you, I'm really sorry about that. When I saw what happened I got so angry I didn't consider how you felt at that moment."

"It's okay," Thomas reassured him, "I deserved that. I mean, I was the one who pulled the trigger, no one forced me to do that."

"Don't blame yourself, you _were_ forced. If you hadn't done it he probably would have killed you and then himself. I also doubt Newt was the only one being controlled by WICKED, they probably influenced you decision," Minho said. He sounded different, more serious than usual, his voice was softer.

Thomas knew that Minho was right, but he didn't think he'd ever stop blaming himself for what he'd done.

"I know that look," Minho said, "you still feel like it's your fault, and I suspect telling you it's not won't change that. Just know that you're not alone, all of us have something we blame ourselves for. The trick is to move on, don't dwell on the past. Newt used to do that before you came to the maze and you know how that ended."

"Yeah, you're right," Thomas said.

"Of course I'm right," Minho said with his usual smirk, "and if you need to talk about it or something I'm here, don't forget that."

"Thanks, Minho," Thomas said.

Minho opened his mouth to say something, but at that moment they heard a creaking sound from behind.

Thomas turned and saw that it had just been Newt shifting position in his sleep. He was lying on his side, facing Thomas and Minho. He looked younger in his sleep, without the sadness and stress they all experienced.

"The most important thing right now is that he's still here," Thomas said, "we can save him this time, and doing that is probably the only way I can forgive myself."

"Then it's a good thing we're gonna succeed," Minho said.

"Did Rat man say anything new about when the cure will be ready?" he added as an afterthought.

"He told us they have a theory about how to create the cure, they'll test it out during a new trial and if it works they should be done within a few weeks," Thomas reported.

Minho looked burdened by that information, but not surprised.

"A few weeks," he repeated, "we can do it, we have to. I know Newt, he can do just about anything as long as he doesn't give up."

"We'll have to help him as much as we can, make sure he doesn't get upset, and stuff like that," Thomas said, "we need to be there for him this time. wether he gives up or not is up to him, but we can affect that decision."

Minho nodded.

They stood in silence for a few seconds, looking at their friend. Seeing him so at pease gave Thomas a feeling of hope, he felt like they could get out of their current bad situation, find the cure and get away from WICKED, be happy.

Minho looked back at Thomas.

"When all this blows over- the flare, WICKED, you know- be good to him. If you hurt his feelings I'll have to hurt you,"

"Hurt his feelings? What do you mean?" Thomas asked in confusion.

"Man, you are one oblivious shank, what he sees in you is beyond me," Minho said, shaking his head. He sounded like he was back to his normal self. Thomas felt no less confused.

He was about to ask Minho what he was talking about, but the other gladers came into the room before he had the chance to.

"Can you tell us how the meeting went now?" Frypan asked.

"No," Minho said, "Newt is sleeping, I don't think we can wake him up, and if we have the gathering without him he's gonna get annoyed." He said the last part like it was something scary.

"Are you scared of annoying him?" Thomas asked jokingly.

"Yes," Minho said seriously, "did I ever tell you about the time when I had to spend three days in the slammer?"

"No, what happened?"

"I made fun of his accent one too many times, so he convinced Alby to call a gathering. He put me on trial for being too annoying, and he swayed all the keepers to his cause."

"To be fair, you were annoying us all, it didn't take much convincing," Gally said.

Thomas wished he'd been around to see that. He realised with a chill that he might have witnessed it, before he was sent to the glade, he couldn't be sure, but he knew the gladers had been monitored, and he had helped WICKED with the variable. He decided not to think about that.

"So what do we do now?" Gally asked, "we just wait?"

"Well we can't have the gathering now, but while we're waiting you guys can tell me more about what happened in the glade before I got there," Thomas suggested.

Minho smiled wickedly.

"That's a great idea. Just wait til' you hear about how Gally got lost in the deadheads."


	13. Story

Chapter 13.

Thomas listened with amusement as Minho told him all about how Gally went into the deadheads to explore, got lost, and ran out screaming four hours later.

The others looked impatient, Thomas knew they wanted to hear how the meeting went, but Newt was still sleeping and they would need him for the gathering. Thomas suspected they couldn't wake him up, since he'd seen Frypan poke him several times without getting any kind of reaction.

"And then he told us there were monsters hiding in there," Minho continued the story.

Gally's face was red with embarrassment.

"It was dark, Beetle blades look like monsters when all you can see is their creepy glowing red eyes," Gally said defensively.

"you should have gone in earlier in the day if you were scared of the dark," Minho teased.

"And you should've sent someone after me when I didn't return," Gally retorted.

"We thought you were sulking and wanted to be left alone," Minho said.

"Whatever," Gally said, "now it's my turn to embarrass you."

With that Gally launched into the story about how Minho had decided to catch one of the earlier mentioned beetle blades and failed epically.

After that the others pitched in with stories of their own, eager to make fun of each other, seemingly forgetting all about being impatient.

Thomas sat in silence, content with just listening.

As the gladers talked Thomas realised how close they were to each other, They had all formed a bond from being stuck in the maze, where they'd had to rely on each other constantly.

They were more than just friends, they were a family. Even Gally, despite having had many disagreements with them (not to mention the whole Chuck ordeal), was a part of it

Then there was Thomas. He hadn't had much time to get to know his fellow gladers. He hadn't been in the maze for nearly as long as they had. Most of the gladers had died in the first two trials, which had brought the survivors even closer together.

Thomas was an outsider. He hadn't even know everyone's name before listening to the ongoing conversation (they were nine including Thomas. He already knew Newt, Minho, Frypan and Gally. He'd heard one of the others being called Alex earlier that day, and the other three were called Al, Doug and Niko).

He did have a pretty close friendship with Newt and Minho, but that was nothing compared to what the two of them had with each other.

He decided to give it time, that was probably the only thing he could do. Maybe one day he'd finally feel like he belonged. He knew that putting too much thought into it would only make things worse, so he shifted his attention to the others' talking instead.

His earlier thoughts had been forgotten after a few minutes. He was smiling along with his friends and he would have gladly spent the rest of the day like that, but the moment was disrupted by a loud knock on the door.

The conversation stopped. Minho got up to open (or possibly block the door so he wouldn't have to deal with more WICKED employees), but the door opened before he got close.

The woman standing on the other side was wearing the same armor as the other guards (some of it, anyway), but it looked like it had been put on in a rush. She had seemingly forgotten her gun, she had also skipped the uniform's jacket, wearing only a bulletproof vest that revealed the pink sleeves of the shirt she was wearing underneath.

Her helmet was slightly askew, revealing a mop of frizzy black hair.

She also looked much younger than any other guard Thomas had seen, barely older than he was.

The gladers stared at her in utter confusion.

"Um… hi," she said. Thomas was pretty sure she was blushing.

"I'm supposed to take Thomas to meet with Teresa."

Thomas got up eagerly. As much as he'd enjoyed being with the other gladers, he couldn't wait to talk to Teresa.

"I'll see you later then," he said to his friends.

"If you take too long I'll come for you, and I better not find you two making out," Minho threatened.

Thomas had no desire to make out with Teresa, but he doubted Minho would stop with his teasing either way, so he left the room without responding.

Thomas had no idea where they were going, the only thing he knew was that it took a long time to get there.

The guard stared at Thomas with fascination whenever she thought he wasn't looking. Eventually Thomas got very annoyed.

"Who are you exactly?" he asked. He would normally consider it too risky to ask guards questions like that, but this guard looked about as threatening as a kitten.

"I'm Emma Jackson, I work here as a security guard," she said.

"Aren't you a bit too young to work as a security guard? I mean, what are you, like seventeen?" Thomas must've guessed wrong, because she looked offended.

"I'm eighteen. Two years older than you, I might add."

"How do you know how old I am?" Thomas asked, feeling slightly unnerved.

"You guys are everything anyone talks about around here, and I've lived here since I was a toddler. I know basically everything about you. For example, your birthday is on the twenty-third of January, Newt turned seventeen in April, and Minho turned seventeen in June," she said.

Thomas felt even more unnerved. He realised this girl had probably grown up watching him and his friends from security camera videos. She talked like she knew everyone personally, and she probably did.

"You looked much more intimidating on screen," she said thoughtfully. Thomas scowled at her. She had the nerve to laugh.

"How much longer do we have to walk?" Thomas asked, eager to meet Teresa and perhaps even more eager to get away from the weird guard.

"We'll get there in like a minute or so," the weird guard responded, then she smiled, as if she was remembering something funny.

Thomas raised his eyebrows at her questioningly.

"I used to hope you and Teresa would get together, before that whole disaster in the scorch."

"Excuse me?"

"I think you would have made a cute couple, that's all," she said, "but that was like, way back. Until you went and got a crush on-" she stopped herself before she revealed whom exactly Thomas had gotten a 'crush' on.

"You know what? I think I'm just gonna let you figure that out for yourself, you oblivious shank."

Thomas glared at her. She had no right to use the gladers' slang. The word sounded wrong when she said it.

Thomas didn't ask her anything else. They walked in silence until she stopped in front of a half-open door.

"She's in there, do you remember the way back?"

Thomas nodded.

"Great. See you later then," she said before turning around and walking away. Thomas hoped he _wouldn't_ see her later.

He pushed the door open and he saw her, Teresa.

She had been reading a book, but she looked up at the sound of the door moving.

She threw the book aside. It landed on the floor with a thud, but she didn't care. She stood up from her chair and rushed over to Thomas.

It looked like she was going in for a hug, but she hesitated at the last second, pulling back and looking somewhat embarrassed.

Thomas felt confused. Did she think he'd push her away or something? Thomas wrapped his arms around her instead. She returned the hug, but it felt awkward.

Thomas stepped back, and suddenly he didn't know what to say to her anymore.

"Hi," Teresa said uncertainly.

"Hey," Thomas replied, just as uncertainly, "so…um…thank you for saving my life I suppose." Thomas cringed inwardly at how stupid he sounded.

"Yeah, about that," Teresa looked up at him, her normally pale face was flushed red, "do you remember what I said to you?"

Thomas nodded, he would never forget what she'd said as she lay dying. 'I only ever cared for…'. She hadn't gotten to finish the sentence, but Thomas assumed the last word was 'you'.

"Well, I'd like to explain what I meant, so there's no misunderstanding. It's true that I only ever cared for you, it's just that I don't feel like that anymore. I did love you, in the maze, and maybe before that, but then things just got so complicated, and I'm not sure if I even want to be in a relationship at all right now. I'm sorry Tom. But I'd still like to be friends with you, if that's okay," she looked at Thomas, waiting to see how he'd react.

Thomas smiled in relief.

"You don't have to apologise for anything, I feel the same way, and of course I want to be friends with you. Just don't sacrifice your life for me again,"

She returned his smile.

"Don't worry, I will certainly not do that again, getting crushed by a rock hurts."

The tension had disappeared, to Thomas' relief.

"Oh, I almost forgot," Teresa said, "they gave us food," she gestured at a small table behind her. The table was made up fancily, and the food even looked edible. There were two chairs on opposite sides of the table, one of which Teresa had been sitting in when Thomas came. All in all it looked like someone had organised a date for them.

"I think they're trying to set us up," Teresa said.

"You're probably right," Thomas agreed, "I met this weird guard earlier, and she said she used to want us to get together."

"So either they want us to like, fall in love so they can get some kind of reaction, or they just think we look good together," Teresa speculated, "at least it looks better than breakfast."

"Speaking of breakfast, where were you? Harriet and Sonya told me a guard came to get you, what did they want?"

Teresa shrugged.

"I'm not entirely sure, some sort of brain scan I think. Didn't they do that to you too?"

"No," Thomas said with a frown.

Neither of them fully understood the logic of how WICKED operated and, deciding to drop the subject, they sat down to eat.

It was actually kind of nice. They shared some small talk between bites. Thomas asked her about the book she'd thrown on the floor and she explained that it was about how the human brain functioned. He supposed a bit of extra knowledge couldn't hurt.

They sat and talked a few minutes after they'd eaten, then Thomas got up.

"We should get back to the others," he said.

"Are you sure you want me to come with you? The others don't like me all that much," Teresa sounded uncertain again.

"Then maybe it's time they actually get to know you, don't worry, they're good people, you just made a bad first impression,"

"Fine, but I hope you know the way."

Thomas grinned as he led the way. It was true that the other gladers weren't particularly fond of Teresa, but he hoped they could change their minds.

"Tom?" Teresa said.

"What is it?" he asked.

"I'm glad to be friends with you again, I missed you."

"I missed you too," Thomas said. And he had, he just hadn't realised it until then.


	14. Reconciliation

Chapter 14.

Thomas and Teresa were both silent as Thomas led the way to the other gladers.

Thomas figured Teresa was trying to gather up some confidence for the somewhat unexpected reunion. That's what Thomas would have done in her place. The other gladers didn't think much of Teresa, but they might at least respect her if she strode in with her head held high.

Thomas would try his best to get his friends to accept her as part of the group, because she was one of them, for better or worse. He was hoping they would be a bit less hostile after her earlier sacrifice, but only time would tell.

The walk to the room felt much shorter on the way back, before long they were standing in front of the door.

Thomas looked at Teresa to see if she looked nervous. She didn't. The look on her face was one of determination.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine," she said when she saw him looking at her.

Then she reached for the door handle.

The gladers saw Thomas first. They looked at him with anticipation. Minho opened his mouth to say something, but Thomas would never know what it was.

He had seen Teresa. His mouth closed and the look on his face hardened, the lacy smile gone. He stood up, crossing his arms as he stepped in front of the others like he thought she was going to attack them or something.

The others looked at her with varying levels of distrust. The only one who didn't was Newt, he appeared to have woken up recently and was just staring at them groggily.

"What is she doing here?" Minho demanded, looking at Thomas.

"She-" Thomas began.

"'She' is standing right here, and she can speak for herself," Teresa said. Her voice was steely.

"Well excuse me for not wanting to speak to the chick who almost convinced the other group to kidnap and kill one of my friends while working with WICKED and lying about everything."

"Excuse _me_ for being controlled and manipulated by WICKED you absolute-"

"Guys, stop it," Thomas said, deciding it would be best to intervene since the looks on their faces and clenched fists suggested the argument would not end well if it continued.

"Teresa only did what she did in the scorch because she was forced to, she ended up saving my life afterwards. I trust her, why can't you just give her a chance?"

"She's always lying! How can we possibly trust her when we have no idea whose side she's on?" Minho replied, looking unconvinced.

"I'm a part of this group whether you like it or not. I don't care if you trust me or not, that's your problem, but you'll have to deal with me regardless," Teresa said.

"Fine! But I'll be watching you, if you pull a stunt like the scorch again it will not end well for you," Minho threatened.

Teresa nodded, if the threat had worried her she didn't let on.

"Fair enough," she said, "does anyone else have a problem?"

She looked at the other gladers, challenging them to say something. No one responded.

"Good. I think Thomas has something to tell you now,"

Thomas and Teresa sat down with the others. There were still suspicious glances sent Teresa's way, but she ignored them.

"I have good news and bad news," Thomas began, "the good news is that Rat man agreed to the deal, they answer our questions, we're allowed to go wherever we want in the building and no one dies. Also, Frypan will get to cook the food during the next trial."

Thomas looked at the others to see how they reacted. They looked relieved but somewhat tense with the anticipation of the bad news.

"The bad news is that there's going to be another trial, and we're apparently gonna be free to act on our own a lot, but it sounds like they planned something really bad for us. Rat man said they should have the cure within a few weeks afterward."

Thomas glanced at Newt to see how he would take the last part of what he'd said. His friend looked a bit more alert than when he'd entered the room with Teresa, but he still looked tired. His expression didn't change. Either he was too tired to process the information, was concealing his emotions, or he simply didn't care.

"Do we have some kind of strategy?" Gally asked.

"Focus on the task at hand and get it done as fast as possible," Minho said.

"Think things through properly before doing them," Teresa suggested.

Then they were all looking at Thomas. For a split moment he wondered why, then he remembered that he was kind of the leader.

"Um…" he had no idea what to say, at that moment he felt incredibly stupid. The silence was starting to get awkward, but Newt saved Thomas from the embarrassing situation.

"We stick together," he said, drawing the attention of the gladers, "we'll be stronger that way. And we need to trust each other. If we don't this group will fall apart, and if anyone thinks differently they're bein' bloody stupid."

"Exactly," Thomas agreed, "but other than that we can't really decide on what to do, we'll have to wait until we know more about what we're up against. Right now we have the opportunity to explore this place and ask questions, learn more about what's happening. That's what we should do now, we might come across something useful."

"Right. So we'll split into groups of maybe three or two and take a look around," Minho said, then he looked at Thomas, "can you do your telepathy thing and tell Aris to have group B do the same thing?"

Thomas nodded.

 _"_ _Aris, are you there?"_ He thought. He waited, but there was no response.

 _"_ _Aris!"_ Still nothing, nothing from Aris anyway. He saw Teresa flinching from the corner of his eye.

 _"_ _I don't think he can hear you, now will you please refrain from shouting all the time? You're giving me a headache,"_ Teresa said.

 _"_ _You try it then,"_ Thomas replied sourly.

Teresa didn't respond, Thomas assumed she was trying to talk to Aris.

"Aris said they were already planning on doing that, but I think he just made that up," Teresa informed the group a minute later.

"Well the important thing is that they're gonna do it," Minho said, "but before we start we should have lunch. I _think_ it's lunchtime at least."

"Teresa and I already had lunch," Thomas said.

"Did you have a lunch date?" Frypan asked teasingly.

"No, we didn't have a 'lunch date'," Thomas said, though he doubted his red face was helping his case.

"Then maybe you two should get started on explorin' the building," Newt said, sounding somewhat grumpy, which Thomas assumed was due to him still being tired.

They got up and left the room. Thomas and Teresa weren't going with the others to the cafeteria, but they decided to follow them until they found an unlocked door or a side corridor. Thomas checked all the doors on the right and Teresa the ones on the left, though they didn't pass many doors and all of those were locked.

 _"_ _You'd think they'd give us a key card or something if they said we could go anywhere,"_ Teresa complained. Thomas was about to reply, but an explosion of pain materialized in his head, there was no warning, just pain. He gripped his head with both hands as if that would make it stop. It didn't. He might have screamed, but he wasn't sure.

He could register people flocking around him, saying words Thomas couldn't understand.

He wasn't sure how, but he'd ended up on the floor, sitting with his back against a wall. He considered banging his head against it, maybe that would miraculously make the excruciating pain go away, if not, then at least he might hit it hard enough to pass out, which was preferable to staying awake and in pain.

Whether or not that would've worked he'd never know, he couldn't move his head, or the rest of his body for that matter.

He wasn't sure how long the agony lasted, but after what felt like an eternity it lessened ever so slightly. He could register a voice, saying something over and over. At first he couldn't hear what, but it slowly came into focus.

"Tommy," it was saying. No, not 'it', 'he'. Thomas recognized the voice, it was Newt.

He opened his eyes, which had been shut tight without him realizing it, and saw his friend crouched on the floor next to him.

The pain receded to a dull throb, though his entire body was trembling.

"What happened?" Newt asked once he saw he had Thomas' attention.

"I-I don't know," Thomas said, trying to keep his voice steady without success, "Teresa was talking to me telepathically. When I tried to respond…" he tried to gesture at his head, but his hand was shaking and he doubted Newt realized what he was trying to do.

But Newt wasn't looking at him anymore, he was glaring at Teresa, who was also crouching next to Thomas, though she was on his other side.

"What did you do to him?" he demanded, his voice was low and threatening, he looked downright terrifying.

"I didn't do anything!" she protested, "I was just talking to him, I didn't-"

"Stop lying! I know you did something," Newt cut her off.

Thomas noticed that Newt was clenching his fists as he spoke.

"Newt, calm down, she didn't do anything," Thomas said.

Newt scoffed, but he didn't make any threatening moves to Thomas' relief. He took his gaze of Teresa and looked at Thomas instead. He looked like he was about to say something, possibly about how Thomas shouldn't trust Teresa, but he apparently decided against it.

"Can you stand?" he asked instead.

"I think so," Thomas said.

By the time Newt had helped Thomas to his feet the throbbing in his head had disappeared completely, though he was still trembling slightly. He felt weak, and if it hadn't been for Newt still holding him he would have fallen to the floor again.

"Should we keep going?" Minho asked, looking at Thomas.

"Yeah, we'd just be wasting time otherwise," Thomas said, trying to sound stronger than he felt.

Newt had an arm around Thomas to support him as they continued walking. Teresa was moving from the left to the right and back again, to check all the doors, which had grown in number.

The sound of door handles being pulled accompanied their footsteps, then it stopped.

"Guys! This door's open!" she called from behind.

Thomas turned to see Teresa holding open a door, she was looking inside.

"Anything interesting?" Gally asked.

"Yeah, it looks like a library, we could definitely find something useful there," she said.

"That's great," Thomas said. He tried to break free of Newt's grip, hoping he would be able to stand on his own, but Newt didn't let go.

"Hang on, you can't go off alone with her after what she just did," Newt protested.

"How many times do I have to tell you I didn't do anything?" Teresa said in exasperation, "besides, you were the one who said we need to trust each other."

Newt scowled at her.

"That implied you had to do something to gain our trust in the first place. Besides, I don't think Tommy can walk on his own and I doubt you're strong enough to support him,"

"I can walk," Thomas said.

"Prove it then," Newt said, letting go of Thomas.

Thomas bent all his willpower on standing steadily, but his knees gave out almost immediately.

Newt caught him easily, having expected it.

"Told ya that would happen," he said.

"Well, we don't have much time to explore, there's a higher possibility of finding something useful if I go with Teresa," Thomas pointed out.

"Fine, then I'll go with you," Newt said.

"Aren't you hungry?" Thomas asked.

"I am, but the others can just take something with them once they're done. Looking through an entire library will take some time, we'll still be here by then so we won't exactly be hard to find.

"Well, now that we've solved that we better get going," Minho said, "see you later."

"Bye," Thomas said as he and Newt made their way to where Teresa was standing.


	15. Library

Chapter 15.

When Thomas heard the word 'library' he would think of vast rooms with bookshelves standing in neat rows, filled to the brim with colorful books. Comfortable armchairs to read in and tables for studying and doing homework.

He wondered briefly if the image was imagination or a glimpse of his past.

The room before him was not what he'd expected.

It was small and shabby, with bookshelves that looked liked they'd seen better years (or centuries), they appeared to have been placed in the room randomly, standing in no discernible pattern. The only place to sit was a sofa in the corner of the room. It might once have been yellow, though the color was too faded for Thomas to be sure. There was a table in front of it that had only three legs (not like it had been built that way, but like it'd had the fourth leg broken off).

Thomas coughed as he entered the room. The warm air smelled like mildew and dust. Thomas wondered when the door had been opened last.

"You okay, Tommy?" Newt asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Thomas said, though it was far from the truth. He felt weak and shaky, and his head may not be throbbing anymore, but the pain wasn't completely gone.

"Where should we start?" Teresa wondered.

"We can start on that side," Newt gestured at the left side of the room, "then we'll work our way over to the other side. Take whatever seems most helpful and start readin'," his voice was a bit cold, but at least he didn't ignore Teresa. Thomas wondered if his distrust of her could have something to do with the flare. He vaguely recalled paranoia being a symptom.

"Newt, do you have those pills on you?" Thomas asked.

"Yeah, why're you askin'"

"Maybe you should take one. No offense, but you're acting a bit…," Thomas trailed off, not knowing what word to use.

"Cranky?" Newt suggested, he sounded annoyed.

"Yeah," Thomas said, hoping he hadn't made his friend mad.

There was a tense silence, Thomas waited anxiously for what Newt would say.

"Maybe you're right," he said with a sigh.

He took out the box from his pocket. He took out a pill, using only one hand since he was still holding Thomas. He swallowed it and put the box back into his pocket.

"Let's get started then," he said.

They moved toward the first bookshelf.

The books looked as old as the rest of the library. Thomas suspected they would fall apart if he removed one from the shelf.

They had decided that Teresa would examine the books in the lower part of the shelf, Newt would take the ones on the top and Thomas got the ones in the middle.

The first book Thomas took out remained intact, thankfully. The only problem was that the title was too faded to read. He could pick out a few letters, but it wasn't enough to put together what the words were.

He flipped the book open. The first yellowed page displayed the words 'The art of fishing' and a name that must belong to the author.

Thomas flipped through the pages, which mostly showed pictures of fishes and short texts informing the reader about the different species and how best to catch them.

Thomas wasn't particularly interested in fishing, but he decided it wouldn't hurt to know. WICKED could be sending them on some kind of mission where they would have to sail across the ocean for all he knew, so he held onto the book.

He soon found out that all the other books on the shelf were also about fishing. At least now he knew that the books hadn't just been placed there randomly.

"Have you found something interesting?" Thomas asked his friends.

"Do you consider fishes interesting?" Teresa questioned.

"Not really. Newt, did you find anything else?"

"No, I'm guessing this shelf is entirely dedicated to fishing," Newt said.

"Maybe we should just take the thickest book and move on," Thomas suggested. He knew that the number of pages in a book didn't necessarily determine it's usefulness, but it would take ages to check every book.

He put back the book he'd first found since it was barely fifty pages long.

"There could be something hidden here that we'd miss if we did that," Newt said, "on the other hand, we don't have the time to search the entire shelf for something that might not even be there. We'll just do what you said, Tommy."

"It might just be this part of the shelf that's about fishing, I'll check the other side of it to make sure," Teresa said.

Once Teresa had confirmed that the whole shelf contained fishing books, they began their search for the thickest book.

Thomas scanned the shelf. Most of the books looked like they had less than a hundred pages, but after a while, Thomas spotted a thick book, which must've had at least five hundred pages, a number that was drastically changed once Thomas pulled the book out and half its content fell out.

Most of the papers landed on Thomas' and Newt's feet with a soft thump, though a fair amount floated -as if carried by an undetectable wind- before they landed. the wooden floor was littered with papers, it was completely covered where Thomas was standing. A mat of paper stretching at least three feet around him.

"Sorry," Thomas said.

"It was only a matter of time before it happened," Teresa said, kicking off a paper that had landed on her foot.

"Do you reckon we have to clean it all up?" Newt asked.

"Nah," Teresa responded, "let's just leave it here so WICKED has to clean it up, as revenge for the simulation."

"That's a pretty small revenge, but why not?" Newt said, "We'll just have to be careful so we don't slip on the pages," he added as an afterthought.

Thomas let go of the now ruined book he was still holding. It fell to the floor with a thud, which resulted in a small dust cloud and more pages falling out.

"We should keep looking, hopefully, the other books will stay intact," he said.

After a few more minutes Teresa found another thick book that was in good condition, at least compared to the other books.

She flicked through the pages and she must have deemed it useful since she didn't put it back in the shelf.

"I think this'll do," she said.

No one argued, so they moved on to the next shelf.

That shelf had books about scientists. Thomas recognized most of the names, but some were new to him.

They might not have a lot of use for those books during their trial, but Thomas wanted to learn about the scientists he didn't know about.

By pure luck, he found a book with 'The encyclopedia of famous scientists' written on it.

He opened it and saw a list of names written in alphabetical order, each name accompanied by a number (presumably the page they were featured on).

He looked at the list of names and found the scientists he and his friends had been named after. Thomas Edison, Isaac Newton, he also found the name George Minho. He hadn't heard about Minho's namesake before, Thomas wondered what he'd done.

He would, unfortunately, have to wait with reading about him, because Newt and Teresa looked like they wanted to move on.

They spent the next hour going through the rest of the bookshelves. They found a bunch of books on hunting and other skills they would need if they were to be sent out into the wilderness.

The books had of course been written before the solar flares, and Thomas wasn't sure how relevant they would be in the current environment. He hoped the books would say something about how to survive in the desert.

During the search for books, Thomas had regained some of his strength and was finally able to stand on his own, albeit somewhat shakily.

By the time they had gone through all the shelves, Newt and Teresa were each holding large piles of books (Newt had insisted on carrying all the books Thomas found too), and they made their way over to the sofa.

Newt and Teresa put the books next to the broken table.

Then Thomas got the idea to fill the space where the table's fourth leg had used to be with a pile of books from the nearest shelf.

They put half of the books on the table, not wanting to place to much weight on it since it looked pretty unsteady.

Teresa sat down on the sofa, picked up a book, put her feet on the table and started reading. The table creaked threateningly, but Teresa either didn't notice or didn't care.

Thomas and Newt sat down next to each other. The sofa creaked, even though they sat down carefully. Thomas wondered for a brief moment if it would break under their combined weight. Thankfully it didn't.

Thomas grabbed the closest book, a slightly faded blue book with the title 'Camping for beginners', at least, that's what he assumed it was called, a few letters were missing so he couldn't be a hundred percent sure. He was about to start reading it when Newt nudged him with his elbow.

"What's this?" His friend asked, gesturing at the book he was holding. Thomas recognized it as the book about scientists he'd picked out earlier.

"I was planning on taking that with me to read if I have any spare time," he explained, "I doubt we'll have any use for it, but I think it looks interesting."

"Really?" Newt asked, obviously not sharing Thomas' interest in the book. He put it back on the table and picked up another book.

"Can we take books with us?" Teresa asked like the idea had just occurred to her.

"Well this _is_ a library, I don't see why we couldn't borrow the books as long as we try to return them later," Thomas pointed out.

"I know, we can take them with us on the next trial, then WICKED can't kill us, because then they won't get their books back," Teresa said jokingly.

"They could just take them from our packs or something," Newt pointed out.

"Not if we use our last dying moments on finding some matches and setting the books on fire," Teresa said.

"Good thinking," Newt said, "you hear that?!" He shouted at whatever spying equipment WICKED was using to eavesdrop on them, "if we die we'll take your books with us!" Then he laughed, a sound Thomas hadn't thought he would hear again.

Thomas and Teresa started laughing too, they couldn't help it, Newt's laugh was infectious.

It felt good to laugh, Thomas felt as if maybe all wasn't lost, there was still good in the world, if only for a few moments.

Thomas eventually tried to stop, but he couldn't, the three of them just sat there laughing like lunatics.

Suffice it to say their friends were pretty surprised when they came barging in.

They stood there for a moment while the three of them tried to snap out of the laughing fits.

"What's so funny?" Minho asked.

"Nothing," Newt said, being the first to somewhat regain control, "what took you so long?"

"We had an argument with a guard," Minho explained, "we were trying to convince him to give us the keys to the other rooms in this corridor, but he wasn't very cooperative."

"I don't think it helped that you threw water in his face," Gally said

"That was an accident."

"You picked your glass up and threw the water at him, how was that an accident?"

"Fine, so maybe it wasn't an accident, but it was his own fault for calling us 'stupid lab rats' and refusing to give us the keys. Besides, you called him a slinthead, I don't think _that_ helped either."

Gally started to protest, but Frypan cut him off.

"You were _both_ being unhelpful."

"Whatever," Minho said, "so anyways, the guard looked like he was about to punch me, but that weird guard from earlier stopped him, then she gave us her key card, so now we can open at least some of the locked doors here."

"Great," Newt said, "we'll stay here for a while and do some readin'."

"We'll split up and start searching the other rooms, see you later," Minho said, "oh, and Newt, I got you this." He held up a sandwich. Then he tossed it at Newt, who caught it reflexively.

"Thanks," he said, scanning the sandwich for mold, biting into it when he deemed it edible.

When the other gladers left they sat quietly and read.

Thomas tried to read as quickly as possible, skipping the parts that wouldn't be useful, like how to make a fire, which they already knew how to do. He couldn't be completely sure how much the other gladers had learned about wilderness survival skills in the maze, so he read most of the book.

After a while, he finished his book. He put it back on the table and looked to see how his friends were doing before picking up another book.

Teresa was reading quickly, her eyes flew over the words with ease.

Newt, on the other hand, wasn't doing so great, he was staring at the words like he couldn't understand them, and he was rubbing his temples like he had a headache.

"Are you okay?" Thomas asked.

"Yeah, I just can't bloody concentrate," Newt responded.

"Maybe we should go to the others, help them search the other rooms, we can just take the books with us and read later," Thomas suggested.

"Sounds like a plan," Teresa agreed.

They got up from the couch and gathered up the books they hadn't read. Thomas had read one book, and Teresa had read two, so they left those behind.

They started to move for the exit when Newt stopped.

"Teresa?" He asked.

"Yes?"

"I owe you an apology. You know, for not trusting you earlier. I was the one who said we should trust each other, and I meant it, but then I just… I don't know, I wasn't thinking clearly," Newt said, looking at Teresa to see what she would say.

"It's okay, I get it, I don't think I would trust me either," Teresa said, "and the flare isn't your fault, I've decided not to judge you too harshly until you're cured."

"So, we're cool then?"

"Totally," Teresa promised.

Then they left the library to go look for their friends.


	16. Continuation

_Authors note:_ _I'm going on vacation a few days after this chapter is posted, I'll be away for a week and I won't write then, so I'm afraid you'll have to wait a bit longer than usual for the next chapter. With that said, I hope you'll enjoy this chapter, reviews and constructive critisism is appreciated._

Chapter 16.

They spent the rest of the afternoon exploring. The key card opened most of the doors in the corridor they had started exploring, but they didn't find anything of interest. Most of the rooms looked like labs, but they were dirty and abandoned.

They looked for hidden compartments but came up short, if there was anything there it had been hidden well.

It wasn't really that surprising, WICKED had definitely made sure that the gladers only saw what they wanted them to see.

They'd left the door to the library unlocked, knowing they would find it, because it seemed a bit too convenient that they'd found an unlocked room with books on how to survive in the wilderness by accident.

The warm and stale air made Thomas feel tired, and the stack of books he was carrying seemed to get heavier by the minute.

He felt relieved when Minho decided it was time for dinner and they made their way to the cafeteria.

The cafeteria wasn't nearly as crowded as it had been before. The only ones there were a group of grumpy-looking security guards seated at a table.

Once they'd grabbed some food and sat down, Teresa took one of the books she'd been carrying and started reading as she ate.

Thomas thought it seemed like a good idea and followed her example, and picked up the book about scientists. As it turned out, he wasn't very good at reading and eating at the same time. At one point he'd gotten so lost in the book that he forgot all about the spoon that he'd been about to bring to his mouth. Then he'd reached the end of the page he'd been reading and accidentally went to turn the page with the hand that was holding the spoon. Thomas had cursed as a spoonful of soup fell on the book and he'd grabbed a handful of napkins and tried his best to wipe away the soup. He'd then decided to wait with the reading until he'd finished his meal.

Around ten minutes after that incident, they had all finished their meals. The group looked at Minho, waiting for him to decide what they should do next.

"Should we continue exploring?" Newt asked when Minho didn't say anything.

"Nah, I think we've all had enough of that for one day, we can continue tomorrow. But now we should wait until group B gets here, see if they've found anything," Minho said.

"Oh, right, I forgot about them," Newt said.

Thomas considered offering to communicate telepathically with Aris, but after what had happened earlier when he talked to Teresa he didn't feel like it. She didn't offer to either.

"Maybe we should read in the meantime," she suggested, not looking up from her book.

Minho looked at her with a slight distaste for a moment, then he spoke.

"Everyone grab a book, and don't pour soup in them like Thomas did."

Thomas glared at Minho but didn't say anything.

The book he'd been reading previously hadn't dried completely, and he decided it would be best to leave it like it was, since he didn't want to risk damaging it, so he chose another book instead.

Thomas had almost read half the book when the other group finally showed up. By then the room was full of people and Thomas didn't notice that group B had arrived until Minho nudged him and pointed at the other side of the room.

The members of the other group were looking around the room as if searching for someone. They must've been looking for the gladers since they started to make their way over to them once they had spotted them. Minho waved at them as they made their way across the room, but no one waved back.

"Did you find anything interesting besides those books?" Harriet asked once she was within earshot.

"No, just a bunch of abandoned labs," Minho said.

"Did you check for hidden compartments?" Sonya asked.

"Of course we did, but there weren't any," Minho sounded slightly offended at the implication that he hadn't thought of doing that.

"Right," Harriet said, "anyways, you have to show us where you got the books."

"What if we don't want to?" Minho asked though he didn't sound serious.

"Then we won't show you where we got these," Harriet pulled up her sleeve, revealing a black wristwatch.

"I was just joking," Minho said, "we found the books in a library in the corridor a bit away from here, we'll show you once you're done eating as long as you show us where to get watches."

"Sounds good to me," Harriet said.

She, Sonya and about half of their group sat down at the gladers' table. The others sat at the table next to them since there wasn't enough room for them to sit at the other table.

Thomas hadn't really thought about how big the other group was compared to his own. There were around twenty people, more than twice as many as

there were in group A.

He remembered being told that they had escaped their maze three days earlier than his own group and with fewer casualties.

Thomas hoped the two groups would go through the next trial together, he would like to get to know the people from group B, or 'glenners' as they called themselves. They had kind of gotten off on the wrong foot, what with WICKED ordering them to kill him and Teresa convincing them he had done something horrible to her, but he hoped they could start over.

If nothing else, thirty people stood a better chance of winning a fight than nine.

He continued reading while waiting for group B to finish. After what he was guessing was around twenty minutes they were finally done and both groups got up and exited the cafeteria. Thomas walked in silence, since he didn't have anyone to talk to. Minho took the lead on their way to the library with Harriet walking next to him. Newt was next to Thomas, but he was talking to Sonya and Thomas didn't want to intrude on the reunited siblings. Teresa was saying something to Aris and the rest of his group were walking together a bit behind Thomas.

Then one of the girls stepped up next to him.

"Hey, how you doing?" She asked.

"Why are you asking?" Thomas wondered.

"I saw what happened in the simulation, on the video. You know, with Sonya's brother. That can't have been easy."

"Um, no, it wasn't, but he's alive now so I'm fine," Thomas said, feeling uncomfortable talking about it with someone he didn't even know.

"My best friend isn't immune either. She caught the flare in the simulation, she wasn't as close to the gone as your friend, but she made us leave her behind after we'd been to Denver. I thought _that_ was bad, but then I saw what happened to you, and I just can't stop thinking about what it would be like if I had to do the same thing to her," the girl went on.

"I'm sorry about that," Thomas said, "don't worry about your friend, we're gonna find the cure soon. By the way, I didn't catch your name."

"I'm Marie," she said.

"I'm Thomas," Thomas said, though he guessed she had already known that.

"I know," she said, confirming his guess, "Teresa told us a lot about you, you know."

"Right, what _did_ she say about me anyway? No one told me what it was."

"Trust me, you don't want to know."

"If it was that bad, why do you even want to talk to me?"

"Nothing of what she said about you was true, she told us as much yesterday, and you don't seem like that bad of a person," she explained.

Thomas didn't have anything to say in response, so they just walked in silence until they arrived at the library. Everyone in group B entered except for Sonya, who was going to show them the way to wherever group B had gotten their watches.

As it turned out, group B had explored the corridor outside their room.

Here it is," Sonya announced, gesturing at a door.

Minho opened it and peered inside.

He went inside, gesturing for the others to follow.

The room turned out to be a giant wardrobe, there were stacks of clothes, though not normal clothes, there were camouflage clothes and guard uniforms, unfortunately, none of the weapons the guards usually carried were there.

To top it all of there was a table on the far side of the room with a bunch of wristwatches on it.

Thomas grabbed a bulletproof vest, a camouflage jacket, a pair of camouflage pants, a watch, and a pair of combat boots. He had to try on several pairs of boots before finding a pair big enough to fit him, which made Minho teasingly call him 'Bigfoot'.

Once they had all grabbed a set of clothes they exited the now emptier room.

"Did you only take watches when you were here?" Thomas asked Sonya since neither she nor the others in her group appeared to have any new clothes.

"No, we took clothes too, we left them in our room," Sonya explained.

After that, they started walking, and before long they were outside the gladers' room

"I should get going, are you coming with me?" Sonya asked, looking at Teresa

Thomas wondered for a split second why Teresa would do that, then he looked at his new watch and realized that it was getting kind of late, and Teresa would sleep with group B like the previous night.

"Yeah, I'm coming with you," Teresa said, "Goodnight guys. Oh, and you might want these," she added, gesturing at the stack of books she was carrying. She handed the books to Minho, who glared at her but took the books, instead of glaring back, she smiled teasingly, which didn't make Minho look any happier.

"Goodnight," Thomas said before a fight broke out, "is Aris coming to us or should we go get him?"

"Actually, I don't think he wants to sleep in the same room as you again, he told me you guys snore really loudly," Sonya said.

"He was right about that," Newt mumbled, "see you later then."

"Bye," Sonya said, then the girls walked away.

Thomas opened the door to their room and was surprised to see none other than Rat man standing inside.

"There you are," he said, "I was beginning to think you'd gotten lost."

"What do you want?" Minho demanded. He'd moved in front of Thomas and the rest of the group.

"Come in and I'll tell you," Rat man said patiently.

The gladers obeyed. Once he was inside the room Thomas saw that Rat man had brought two security guards with him.

"Are you gonna tell us now?" Thomas asked. He wanted to know what it was that was so important.

"Yes. As you know, you're about to be sent on a fifth trial. I can see you have already prepared, which is good because the trial begins tomorrow morning." He paused to let the statement sink in.

"Tomorrow?" Thomas asked, unsure if he'd heard that right.

"Tomorrow," Rat man confirmed, "you want to find the cure as fast as possible, don't you?"

Thomas didn't respond. Of course he wanted to find the cure as fast as possible, he was just taken aback. He guessed he shouldn't be too surprised, seeing as they'd never had a long time to recover after the previous trials.

It was just that the next trial had seemed far away, something to worry about later, and now they were apparently supposed to leave next day.

"We have another facility, it's not far away from here if you're traveling by Berg, but you'll be walking there, so it will take a while. You will probably be happy to hear that we have some of your friends over there, the ones that were taken by grievers and some of those that got stuck out there after the walls closed," Rat man continued.

"How many of them?" Newt asked, somehow managing to look worried and relieved at the same time

"You'll see once you get there," Rat man answered before continuing, "you will be given supplies and directions tomorrow, now I suggest you get some sleep, you'll need it."

Then he left the room along with the two guards.

"Wait!" Thomas said as the door closed. How could he just leave? Thomas had a bunch of questions he wanted answered. He tried to go after, but the door was suddenly locked. He groaned in frustration.

"Well that was rude," Minho said.

"Rude indeed," Newt agreed, "should we start working on our strategy now?"

"Yeah," Minho said, "so, we don't have all the information yet, but what we do know is that we'll be walking a long distance. I don't know what kind of supplies we'll get, but we should try to take as much as we can without getting weighed down. Now we need to get as much sleep as possible and we'll talk more about this when we know more about what we're up against."

No one argued, though Thomas knew he wouldn't be able to fall asleep easily. His mind was spinning, trying to process everything. He guessed the others felt similarly.

No one said anything as they got into their bunk beds.

Thomas forced his eyes shut, but sleep didn't come, he was too busy wondering what would happen the next day. And what about the gladers in the other facility? He wondered if Ben was one of them, he could have been taken out of the maze after he was banished. How would he react to seeing Thomas? Would he blame him for getting banished? Try to kill him again?

His banishing seemed to flash before Thomas' closed eyes over and over again until he opened his eyes.

He looked around the room at the other gladers. It was dark, but he'd gotten used to the darkness by then. His eyes met with Newt's. They simply looked at each other for a while, it made Thomas feel calmer for some unknown reason, before he knew it his eyelids started to feel heavy. He closed his eyes again, this time feeling tired, and finally fell asleep.


	17. Beginning

_Author's note:_ _I'm really sorry for taking so long to post the new chapter. As I said in the previous author's note, I went on vacation for a while. When I got home again school started, so that's why it took so long. I'll try to keep posting a new chapter every week. With that said, I hope you like this chapter._

Chapter 17.

Thomas woke up after a few hours of peaceful slumber. He was lying on his back with one of his arms squeezed under him. He was pretty sure he hadn't fallen asleep like that, and it wasn't very comfortable. Most of his arm had gone numb, but he could feel a dull ache in his wrist like there was something hard digging into it.

He was puzzled for a moment until he realized that he was still wearing his watch.

He extracted his arm, which went from numbness to the tingle of pins and needles. He waited for it to go away. When the sensation had faded he took the watch off. He held it up in front of his face so he could see what time it was. He wasn't particularly surprised when he found out that it was only a few minutes after five in the morning.

He groaned internally.

He put the watch on top of the small stack of books next to his bunk. He'd made a habit of not taking it off -he never knew when he'd be forced to run for his life without any time to gather up his things- but he doubted anything would happen, and if something _did_ happen it'd be easy to snatch it up without wasting any time.

Thomas looked around the room to see how his friends were doing. At least the majority of the group was asleep if the snoring was anything to go by.

From the other side of the room, he saw Minho, sleeping with his hand hanging over the side of the bed. He was snoring loudly. Newt was in the bunk below, unlike Minho, he wasn't snoring. Those assumed he was sleeping, though he couldn't tell since his friend had his back turned.

Thomas tried to go back to sleep, after all, he didn't know how much he'd get to sleep in the next few days. The only problem was that he didn't feel tired in the slightest. He pulled his blanket over himself and forced his eyes shut, but sleep didn't come.

He gave up quickly since he realized it wasn't going to work. He reached over the side of his bunk bed, picked up his watch, grabbed the book that had been under it, and put the watch back down on the now smaller pile of books.

He figured making himself useful was better than just lying on his bed doing nothing, but when he opened the book he found that he was completely and utterly unable to concentrate.

It wasn't because of the dimness of the room, nor was it due to the earlier mentioned snoring (though those factors certainly didn't make things easier). He'd briefly forgotten about what awaited them in just a few hours, but when he opened the book he was brought back to reality and found himself suddenly overwhelmed by a flood of thoughts, memories, worst-case scenarios, and the feeling of dread.

They could all be dead within twenty-four hours. What if they got attacked by an army of cranks? What if they got lost and died from dehydration or starvation? What if WICKED had decided that they didn't need the gladers anymore and planned to send them into some kind of death trap?

He tried to stop those thoughts, tried even harder to put his attention on the book, but when his gaze swept over the words he couldn't make sense of them, he wasn't even sure what the book was about.

He closed it in frustration, but he didn't put it away. He didn't really feel like moving, so he just held the book up before himself. He stared at the front page, which displayed a title he didn't read and a faded picture of a rope tied in a complicated way. He guessed the book was about how to tie knots or make snares or something along those lines. It seemed kind of fitting since he felt like a noose was tightening around his throat. He felt like he couldn't breathe. He wanted to get up, wake the others and then get the stupid trial over with. Unfortunately, he couldn't. He was pretty sure the door was still locked, and the people at WICKED had probably made exact plans for everything, including the time they left, they wouldn't just let them leave when they felt like it. Thomas didn't think his friends would be too happy about being woken up at five in the morning for no reason.

He spent the next hour or so lying on his side, staring at the wall and wondering what would happen to them. He wondered what the outside world was like for the millionth time. Were there still cities out there, or had the last safe places been overrun with cranks like Denver? Who would they meet out there? It could just be cranks, but he found himself hoping they'd encounter someone not infected, or maybe an immune like them. He'd like to hear about what was actually going on in the world from someone who wasn't working for WICKED, though he guessed WICKED would have complete control over who they met. Still, he couldn't stop himself from hoping. He also couldn't stop himself from wondering if there even were any people left out there. What if there were only the people in the building they were in, their friends at the other facility, a few scattered immunes, and the rest were all cranks? He wondered again if the cure would be enough to save the human race at this point. Sure, it would probably save the few people who weren't infected or in the early stages of the flare, assuming there were any of those left. It would hopefully work on people past the gone, but he found it more likely that it wouldn't be able to repair the severe brain damage they suffered.

He tried not to think about that possibility.

He imagined what it would be like to create the cure, only to find out that it was too late to cure Newt. That thought made his heart break. And he knew he wasn't the only one who had a friend who was infected. There was a girl in group B, the one who'd talked to Thomas earlier, she'd told him her friend was infected, she was probably having the same thoughts as Thomas.

And they weren't the only ones. There were billions of people who'd had their loved ones taken away by the flare over the last decade. Most of those people were gone now, only a few remained. He hadn't given those people much thought before, but he realized that they had it way worse than him. Sure, he may have been put through a set of hellish trials where he'd seen his friends die around him, but the people out in the world had to live in the scorched and chaotic wilderness that was their planet, where surviving each day was a trial, they had not only seen their friends die, they'd had to watch them go crazy first, sometimes even having to kill them themselves like Thomas had done with Newt.

They lived with the knowledge that they would either die from the flare or get killed by cranks. They didn't have the hope of finding a cure that Thomas had.

He was starting to wonder if WICKED really was as bad as he'd thought it was. They may have done bad things, but they were at least trying to create a cure.

He didn't like those thoughts, it was easier just hating WICKED. But the more thought he put into it, the more he felt like he was the bad guy. He and his friends hadn't wanted to help WICKED, they'd tried to escape. Sure, it was reasonable to want to do that, after all, they'd been hurt, lied to, and treated like test subjects, their response to that was only logical, but if enduring that would save all of humanity, wasn't it worth it?

In the end, it came down to who he chose to save. His friends or everyone else in the world. Of course, he didn't want to risk losing more of his friends, but if they didn't stop the flare he doubted they would last for long anyway. Newt would die for sure, and the others may be immunes, but that didn't save them from the harsh conditions of the new and dangerous world. Getting the cure was the only option, and he couldn't believe he'd thought otherwise.

Come to think of it, it was actually pretty hard to believe. He wondered if the people at WICKED had been playing with his mind again, what if they had implanted the thoughts of escaping?

He stopped himself in his thinking. There was no point in trying to figure out what was real and what wasn't. The only thing that mattered was finding the cure and doing what he could to protect his friends while doing it. After that, he'd make sure they got as far away from WICKED as possible.

His trail of thought was interrupted when someone from behind nudged him. He nearly jumped out of his skin. He turned around to glare at the person who'd startled him.

It turned out to be Newt. At first, he looked surprised at the glare, but it turned quickly to amusement.

"Did I interrupt your beauty sleep?" He asked teasingly.

"No," Thomas said indignantly, sitting up, "I've been awake since five."

"Did you have trouble sleeping?" Newt asked in a more serious voice.

"Nah, I just woke up early," Thomas explained, "what about you? Did you sleep well?"

"Not really," Newt said, then he added, "by the way, the door just unlocked, we'll leave for the cafeteria when everyone is ready."

Then he walked off.

Thomas put on his new clothes over what he was currently wearing. He might regret it if they were thrown into another desert, but he would have to deal with that later.

He checked his watch before putting it on. It was around half past six, an hour and a half from when he woke up.

He looked at the stack of books next to his bed, he considered leaving them there so he wouldn't have to carry them around, but there was a possibility they wouldn't get to return to their room.

When everyone was ready they left for the cafeteria. There was a solemnness hanging over the group like a dark cloud. No one spoke, they were all too wrapped up in their own thoughts.

Thomas wished they would walk faster. The anticipation was killing him.

Just outside the cafeteria, they met group B.

"Good morning, we were waiting for you," said Teresa. Thomas noticed that she was holding a backpack. In fact, as he looked at the other members of the group he saw that they all had backpacks.

"Are those the supplies for the trial?" He asked. Not greeting Teresa back was probably considered rude, but he was curious.

"Yeah, these backpacks are the supplies," she said.

"Wait. You mean you only got those backpacks? That's it?" Minho asked.

"A few of the backpacks had pocketknives in them, but otherwise that's it," Harriet said, "but there's no food, no water."

That was not what Thomas had wanted to hear. It would make things way harder. No food was bad enough, but no water? And even if they managed to find water, they had no way to take any with them, because they didn't have anything to put it in.

"What's stopping you from just taking food from the cafeteria?" Minho asked.

"They are," Teresa said, stepping to the side and pointing at two security guards. Thomas hadn't noticed them before, mostly because Teresa had been standing in front of them. The guards scowled at Teresa, apparently, they didn't like being pointed at.

"They won't let us back inside," she said, glaring back at the guards. They didn't say anything, but their scowls deepened.

As Thomas looked at the guards, he spotted a pile of backpacks, the same as the one's group B had.

"Are those for us?" He asked, gesturing at the backpacks.

Teresa nodded.

Thomas went to grab one, but one of the guards pushed him back.

"You'll get your backpacks after you've eaten," he said.

"Or we could just take them now," Minho suggested.

"We're not stupid," the other guard said, "if we let you take them with you you'll just use them to smuggle out food."

"Of course you're not stupid," Minho said, though his tone of voice said something different.

The guards did not appreciate the comment, seeing as they started to reach for their guns.

"Come on, let's go," Newt said, steering Minho away from the guards he'd just insulted. The rest of the group followed them into the cafeteria.

Thomas fell into step beside Newt, who was chiding Minho on how he was going to end up getting shot if he didn't 'stop insulting people every bloody time the possibility arose'.

They may not have been able to take the backpacks with them, but that wasn't the only way to smuggle out food.

The day's breakfast consisted of flavorless granola bars, which Thomas found very convenient. Not because he liked flavorless granola bars, but because they were small enough to fit in his pockets. He grabbed a bunch of the things and followed his friends to a table. He looked around cautiously, but no one seemed to be paying them any attention. He stuffed his pockets with as many granola bars as he could without it being too visible. The other gladers did the same thing. After that, he ate the remaining granola bars and drank as much water as he could.

The group finished quickly, then went back to where group B was waiting. The two guards didn't stop them from taking their backpacks this time, and apparently, they were stupid, because they didn't even ask them to turn out their pockets to see if they'd smuggled any food out.

Thomas opened his backpack to see if there was anything inside of it. Of course, there wasn't. He put the books in it. He would put the granola bars in there later since now wasn't exactly the time.

He closed the backpack and put it on his back. He looked at the others. They looked kind of like a bunch of normal teenagers about to go camping if you ignored the scared looks on most of their faces.

They stood there for a long time, waiting for someone to come and give them instructions. They had tried asking the guards questions, but they claimed not to know the answers, and they looked more and more aggravated each time someone spoke to them.

The few conversations struck up between the teenagers were short-lived. Small talk wasn't easy when you were thinking of all the horrible ways you could die in the next few days.

There was finally a sound coming from behind a corner of the corridor. Footsteps against the linoleum floor.

Soon Rat man was standing in front of them.

"Good, I see you are prepared," he said, "and I suppose you want me to tell you more about the trial now."

"Just bloody get on with it," Newt said impatiently.

"Very well. As I told you, you will walk to our other facility, where some of your friends are waiting for you. It lies north from here, about a hundred miles. It won't be hard to find once you get close. If you didn't know, we are in a place called Alaska, it's in the north, where the weather has started to return to what it was before the solar flares, so it can get relatively cold out there. You will be walking through a forest terrain. I hope you've spent enough time with the books we provided you with to know basic survival skills."

He paused for a moment to let the information sink in, then he spoke again.

"Now that you know what to do, I believe you are ready to begin your fifth trial."

He led the way through some corridors until they came to a small door. When he opened it a sudden chill came into the room. It got colder once they were actually outside though.

They were standing in a small area with high fences that would occasionally spark with electricity.

Rat man punched in the code on a rusty door. It swung open with an awful creaking sound like it hadn't been opened in years.

They began to exit through the door. Thomas found himself standing in front of a vast forest. It was like nothing he'd seen before. It was much bigger than the small forest in the glade, with massive pine trees spreading their branches over the forest like a green roof.

"Wait," Minho said, he had just stepped past the door, being the last one out, "which way is north?"

"I'm afraid you'll have to figure that out for yourselves," Rat man said. He gave them one last smug look before shutting the door.

This was it. They were on their own now, for better or worse, yet there was something calming about the forest, possibly because Thomas had been expecting some kind of scorched desert.

Then he imagined how easy it would be for a crank to hide in there, sneak up on them when they least expect it.

But for better or worse (probably worse), the fifth trial had begun.


	18. Trial

Chapter 18.

"So, what now?" Thomas asked.

"We need to go north," Harriet said.

"Obviously, but we don't know which way that is," Thomas said.

"So we'll just have to make a compass then," she said, like it was obvious.

"And you can just create a compass out of thin air?" Minho said, looking at her sceptically, at which she rolled her eyes.

"No, but I know how to make one from things we can find here."

"Go on."

"We find something metallic, rub it against something to make it magnetic, and put it on a leaf in water," Harriet explained.

Thomas was hit with a sudden memory of himself as a kid, camping somewhere, and someone was showing him how to make a compass using that very same method.

It disappeared as quickly as it had come, leaving Thomas feeling nostalgic for a better time. He shook the feeling off, he needed to focus on the situation.

"Does anyone have anything metallic?" Minho asked. Everyone shook their heads in unison.

"Great," Minho mumbled sarcastically, looking around in search for a solution. His gaze settled on the fence behind them.

"Maybe we could break off a piece of the fence," he said, moving towards it.

"Stop, you'll get electrified if you touch that thing," Thomas said.

Minho stopped in his tracks.

"Well, what are we supposed to do then?" He asked.

"Maybe we could walk around the building, find a weak spot and try to break a piece off with a stick or something," Newt suggested. The idea didn't sound like it would have a high chance of succeeding, but no one could come up with something better.

It turned out much of the fence had rusted, but their attempts to break it using sticks they'd found on the ground or broken off from low-hanging tree branches proved unsuccessful.

When they had walked around to the other side of the building, about to give up, they spotted a length of barbed wire hanging loose from a corner on the fence. Minho had put the end of the wire between two sticks and pulled with all his strength. At first it looked like it wouldn't work, but then the barbed wire snapped. Minho stumbled backwards. When he'd regained his balance he held the wire up triumphantly.

Thomas got the task of making a compass needle out of the wire. Sonya had handed him a pocketknife before leaving with most of the others to search for water.

Thomas hacked at the wire with the knife. He tried to hold the wire with the sleeves of his shirt, but his hands were bleeding in several places once he was done. He'd have to wash his hands once they found clean water, otherwise he'd probably get an infection from the far from clean metal.

He ignored the stinging pain as he put the now finger-length wire on a rock and used another rock to try and flatten the barbs so they wouldn't cause any problems with showing the right direction.

By the time he was done with that the group that had went in search of a water-source had returned.

Sonya walked up to him. She held out her hand and Thomas gave her back her knife.

"Did you magnetise the wire?" She asked.

"No," Thomas said.

Sonya snatched the piece of metal from him and began rubbing it against the spine of her knife.

Once she was finished she led the way into the forest.

After a short walk they stumbled upon something that almost resembled a swamp, with puddles of murky water everywhere. Thomas literally stumbled upon it, since he accidentally stepped into a patch of moss that turned out to be a surprisingly deep puddle, and almost fell over as he tried to get his foot out of the icy water. When he finally got it out it was soaked up to his ankle. His sock and shoe were wet and cold, but there was nothing he could do about that unfortunately. The cold spread through his entire body rapidly. He pulled his jacket closer around himself as he watched Harriet and Sonya put the piece of wire on a large leaf and place it in a puddle that consisted of

less mud than most of those around them.

The wind was a problem, it had been pretty hard, but it was weaker in the forest and they tried their best to shield the area from any wind, but there was still a chance that it might blow their compass needle off course.

Thomas was filled with relief when it moved, slowly, but surely. When it stopped it pointed to the right, which was deeper into the forest, naturally.

The compass needle was plucked out of the water and they started walking.

Thomas didn't know how long they had been walking for. He could have checked his watch, but he didn't have the energy to spare. The forest had grown thicker and darker. There were noises coming from all around them that he couldn't identify. He might have been scared if he hadn't been exhausted. He felt warm and sweaty from the long walk, but he could tell that the temperature of their surroundings was low.

It must've rained before they left, because the entire forest was wet and slippery, and it had the smell of rain, something Thomas remembered from before the maze.

Every once in a while they'd come across a small river or lake. They used the compass needle to make sure they were going in the right direction when they came across a lake, and when they found a river with water that looked clean they'd drink. They had taken a short break for lunch, which consisted of the granola bars they'd taken earlier that day.

That had been a long time ago. It was starting to get late, judging by the increasing darkness and decreasing temperature.

They decided it was about time to call it a day and make camp for the night.

They settled for a thick cluster of trees that would provide somewhat of a shelter against the wind. They gathered sticks and did their best to stack them against the branches. They didn't have any kind of rope, but they managed to hold it in place by sticking the sticks deep into the muddy ground.

They ate the last of their granola bars in silence. Thomas was still hungry afterwards. They would have to find more food in the morning.

A while after they'd eaten they decided to start a fire, to combat the sinking temperature.

It hadn't been easy, since most of the branches they found were wet. After a long search they had scavenged a handful of dry twigs, which they put in a pile in their shelter. It usually wouldn't be a good idea to start a fire under a tree, but it wasn't too close to any hanging branches, and they had ringed the woodpile with rocks so it wouldn't spread. The humid air and the dampness of their surroundings helped if nothing else.

A girl from group B had started the actual fire, using two knives. It had taken a while for any sparks to come, but after a few minutes there was a small fire spreading through the woodpile. Once the fire had grown in size they fed it the rest of the branches they had found.

Warmth radiated from the fire, making Thomas feel much better.

They crammed together around the fire. It was nice, Thomas wasn't the only one feeling better it appeared.

He took of his shoes to let the warmth of the fire dry his feet. His shoes weren't as waterproof as he'd have liked them to be. He'd been walking around with wet socks for several hours, both of his feet were as wet as the one he'd accidentally stepped into a puddle with.

"How far do you think we got?" Teresa asked from next to him.

"Maybe fifteen miles or so," Thomas guessed. He looked to Newt and Minho -who were sitting on his other side- for confirmation.

"I'd say twenty," Minho said.

"That's good," Thomas said, "that's a fifth of the way, if we keep going like this we'll be finished in five days."

"You're forgetting the traps that were no doubt set up everywhere in this place, they're probably just trying to get us to feel a sense of false security," Teresa said.

"Since when were you such a pessimist?" Thomas asked.

"I'm not a pessimist, I'm just being realistic," she said defensively.

"Well reality sucks, let's not think about it for now," Thomas said.

"How can you possibly _not_ think about it right now?" She asked.

"we're all together, we have a fire, I'm feeling pretty sore from walking, but I'm not in serious pain for once. It's not too hard to believe that everything is normal. Well, maybe that's not normal for us, but you know what I mean," he said.

"Dude, you just cursed us," Minho said.

"I did what now?"

"You said everything feels normal, now something bad is bound to happen," Minho clarified.

"I didn't know you were superstitious," Thomas said.

"Superstitious? You know what, I'll tell you the story about the bloodthirsty demon lurking in the woods and then we'll see who gets superstitious," Minho said.

He proceeded to tell them a ghost story that would actually have been pretty scary if they hadn't been living in a world that was basically taken from a ghost story.

They continued their chatting for a while, until they decided to call it a night. It was only around ten in the evening, but they were all tired from the long walk, and the darkness around them and the warm fire added to the tiredness. Besides, they knew they'd have to get up early the next day.

They decided someone would have to stand guard while they slept, in case they got attacked or the fire got out of hand. Newt volunteered to take first watch, claiming he wasn't tired.

The group spread out in the shelter. They moved away from the fire, not wanting to accidentally set themselves on fire while they were sleeping. Thomas stayed as close to the fire as possible without getting too close. He wanted to soak up the warmth while he could.

They didn't have any blankets or anything, though they could use their backpacks as pillows.

Thomas discovered quickly that he didn't feel like sleeping. He felt sore from the exertion, but he didn't feel tired.

He lay awake for a long time staring into the fire. Watched the flames dance around on the pile of wood. His gaze would sometimes shift to Newt, who was sitting on the other side of the fire, he too looking into it. The fire cast alternating patterns of shadows and light on him, one moment making him look almost ghostlike, the next making his face light up and his hair turn the color of gold. If he noticed Thomas looking at him he didn't give it away. He looked weary, something must be troubling him.

Thomas got up and went to sit next to his friend. Newt cast him a brief glance but didn't say anything.

"Are you okay?" Thomas asked in a low voice. It looked like most of the others were asleep, but he didn't want to disturb anyone, "it's just, it looks like something's bothering you, and you've been quiet pretty much all day."

Newt shrugged. "What can I say? It's just… this whole bloody thing, the maze, the flare…"

"We'll get through it," Thomas said, trying to sound confident, "we beat the maze, we'll get the cure to the flare soon."

"I hope so," Newt said, sounding unconvinced. He didn't look at Thomas, he was staring into the fire again.

"Maybe you should get some sleep, I can keep watch if you want," Thomas suggested.

"No," Newt said immediately.

"It's fine, I'm not tired anyway," Thomas ensured him.

Newt shook his head. "It's not that. I've been having bad dreams for a while now, I'd rather stay awake."

"You can't stay awake forever."

"I know, but I can try."

"Is it that bad? Maybe you can tell me about the dreams, that might make it better," Thomas said.

"I can handle it by myself, you've got enough to worry about," Newt said.

"One of the things I worry about is you becoming a crank because you were thinking too much about stuff like that," Thomas said.

"Fine," Newt relented, "it's about Alby, mostly, anyway. When he sacrificed himself to the grievers, when he found me in the maze…"

Thomas remembered his own dream about Alby. It must have been even worse for Newt, who'd been Alby's friend.

He didn't really know what to say, but he spoke anyway.

"He wouldn't want you to have nightmares about him, if he were here right now he'd tell you that. He'd want you to remember the fun times you had over the bad. Assuming he was capable of having fun, he seemed pretty uptight every time I saw him."

"He _was_ pretty uptight, but we had some good times," Newt said, a hint of a smile on his face.

"All of us have nightmares," Thomas continued, "but they will fade away eventually, just try to remember the good things instead of the bad, and that's what you'll remember in the end, that's the best way for you to honor him. Knowing that might not help you much right now, but just try to keep it in mind and you'll e happier in the future."

"You know, Tommy, you can be really wise sometimes. I actually feel better now. Thank you,"

They didn't talk more after that. They sat in silence, comforted by the fire and each others company.

Suddenly there was a weight on Thomas' shoulder, which he realized was Newt's head. He had fallen asleep.


	19. Chase

Chapter 19.

At one a.m. Thomas was doing great. Sure, he had to sit as still as possible as to not wake his friend up, but aside from that everything was great. The fire was burning, warming him to his core. And he felt happy that he'd made Newt feel better. He didn't have anything to do, but he felt content with just looking into the fire.

At two a.m. Thomas was starting to get bored. He gazed longingly at his backpack on the other side of the fire, wondering why in the world he hadn't taken it with him. Then he'd at least be able to read a book, as long as he turned the pages quietly and didn't hold it too close to the fire.

At three a.m. Thomas was not only bored but was starting to feel tired too. He tried his best to stay alert, but it was a hard task to perform, he almost dozed off several times. On top of that, the firewood was starting to run out. They'd collected a big pile of twigs and branches, but most of it had already been fed to the fire. He wished time would move faster.

At four a.m. Thomas had put the last piece of firewood into the flames, which were burning lower by the minute. He knew he'd have to get more, otherwise, the fire would die and he didn't want to sit in the cold. He didn't want to leave his friends unguarded, but it should be fine if he just picked up a few twigs from outside their camp and got back inside quickly. The only problem was that Newt was still leaning on him, and he didn't want to wake him up if he could avoid it. He tried his best to lower Newt carefully to the ground, but he woke up as soon as Thomas moved. He sat up and looked at Thomas tiredly.

"What happened?" He asked before a look of realization appeared on his face, "I fell asleep on you, didn't I?"

"Yes," Thomas confirmed.

"I'm so sorry," Newt said. Thomas was pretty sure his face had turned red, though it was hard to tell in the flickering firelight.

"Don't worry about it," Thomas said, "now, I need to go and collect more firewood so the fire doesn't die.

Newt glanced at the fire. "Okay, but don't go too far. And take a knife with you."

"I don't have a knife," Thomas said.

"You can have mine," Newt said. He opened his pack and dug around in it for a few seconds before taking out a pocketknife.

Thomas accepted the knife. He thought that it was kind of unfair that only some of them had gotten knives, but then again, they could have gotten no knives at all, so he supposed he should be grateful.

When he stepped out of their shelter the cold hit him. It made him shiver, despite having been seated next to a fire for hours.

The sun had started to rise. It was still pretty dark, especially with the trees blocking out most of the light, but he wasn't completely blind at least.

He looked at the ground but found nothing. He'd forgotten that they had already collected firewood before, meaning he wouldn't find anything nearby. He walked in a direction he was pretty sure they hadn't searched.

He didn't find much, even as he walked further and further away from the others. He'd put the knife in his pocket since he didn't think it would be a good idea to walk around in the darkness holding a knife.

After a few minutes he'd collected a handful of twigs, it wouldn't be enough to sustain the fire for more than half an hour, but he was considering heading back. The forest was so quiet it was eerie, he wanted to get back to his friends as soon as possible.

He decided to walk for two more minutes before heading back.

That's when he heard something from behind a cluster of trees. It sounded like voices, though he couldn't detect any words. His blood turned to ice. The shock made him drop what he was holding. He cringed at the soft thud that wasn't loud, but still a sound. He stood completely still, afraid to cause any further sounds that could alert whatever or whoever he heard to his presence. What if it was a crank? Or even worse, several cranks?

Thomas realized then that the voices had stopped. It was just as quiet as before.

Thomas was torn between going back and going forward. The rational part of his brain nagged at him to get back to his friends, wake them all up immediately, and run in the opposite direction of where the sound had come from.

The curious part of him urged him to go investigate. What if there were people there? His curiosity won, stupid as it was. He made his way toward the direction of the sound, trying his best to be quiet. He took a deep breath before going around the cluster of trees that was obscuring the source of the voices.

He regretted his decision immediately when he'd stepped past the trees.

The scene before him looked like it could've been a campsite once upon a time, but in the present, it was a few piles of torn canvas accompanied by broken camping supplies, something that resembled a half-destroyed campfire and various objects that were smashed past recognition. And that wasn't the worst part. In the middle of the destruction sat half a dozen men and women that were obviously cranks. They were all looking directly at Thomas.

He froze. He didn't know what to do. He considered running away, but what if they followed him? Where would he run anyway? If he ran back to his friends with a bunch of cranks coming after him it would put them in danger, since most of them were asleep and they only had a few pocket knives to defend themselves with. He couldn't run in the opposite direction from his friends either. Then he might not find his way back to them and when they searched for him later they might run into the cranks.

So running was out of the question. There was only one thing he could think of to do instead. He had to talk his way out of the situation, trick the cranks if necessary.

"Um, hello," Thomas said, trying to sound friendly.

"Hello, little boy," said one of the cranks in a slow voice, dragging out each syllable.

"What is the little boy doing out in the woods all alone?" Asked another crank, eying Thomas hungrily. Thomas would have to think fast before he became breakfast for a bunch of insane cannibals.

"I'm not alone," he said, trying to keep his voice steady, "I'm with my friends. Trust me, you don't want to meet them, they're really scary."

He looked around at the cranks to see if they were buying it. Of course they weren't.

"I don't see anyone else here," said a crank that might not have been completely past the gone. Her eyes gleamed with malicious intelligence.

"They're around here somewhere, I should go find them," Thomas said, backing away.

"No!" Said one crank.

"Wait here with us," said another, "we can play a game."

"Yes, let's play a game," Thomas said, trying to sound enthusiastic, "how about hide and seek? I hide and you seek."

The cranks murmured to each other, considering the idea.

"No," said the woman that wasn't past the gone, "he's tricking us. He's trying to get away!" Thomas guessed she was the leader, the others let out grunts of disappointment but didn't oppose her.

"Don't listen to her," Thomas said, " _she'_ s the one trying to trick you. She doesn't want you to have any fun, because…um…She wants to kill you all from boredom!" He cursed himself for not coming up with something more believable, but the other cranks seemingly bought the lie. They mumbled about things that supported the idea, while their leader was arguing and yelling at them for being idiots, which didn't really help her case.

They ganged up on her, some of them holding sharp objects, some baring their teeth at her.

Thomas didn't stay to find out what happened to her -nothing good, judging by the sounds of screaming- he turned on his heel and ran away while the cranks were distracted.

Thomas ran as fast as he could, knowing he didn't have much time before the cranks realised he'd fled.

He cursed the amount of slippery roots he had to avoid stepping on.

He remembered the way he'd come from, which was a small relief. After a few minutes he was back at their camp.

He rushed inside their shelter.

Newt stood up. "Tommy, what's going on?" He asked.

"Cranks," Thomas said. He went over to the others, they were still sleeping. Thomas started shaking them awake.

"Wake up! We have to go!" He told them, trying to be loud enough for them to hear while not being loud enough for the cranks to hear in case they were searching for him.

Newt came over to help him. Together they'd woken everyone up within two minutes at most.

Their friends, despite looking tired, caught on quickly. They were soon on their feet with their backpacks on, ready to go. Thomas ran over to the dying fire and stomped out the flames.

"Five cranks. That way," Thomas explained, pointing at the direction he'd come from.

"But that's north, if we go in the opposite direction we'd be going back to where we started," Harriet said.

"Let's go sideways then," Thomas said, "that way we'll go around them."

No one protested. They hurried out of the shelter. Minho, who was at the front of the group, turned left and started running that way, the others followed.

They ran for about an hour before deciding to take a pause. They talked about what they should do next. They needed food, but they hadn't seen a trace of a single animal, and they didn't have time to set up snares and wait for something to get stuck in it. They would have to search for plants instead. It turned out that both groups had taken a book on edible plants with them. They were starting to plan how many groups they'd split into and how far they'd go in search for food, but as it turned out, they had been followed.

Two cranks stepped out from behind a large boulder, both of them holding knives.

"The little boy isn't alone after all," said one of them.

"Yes, but his friends don't look very scary," noted the other one.

The two groups got up to run in the other direction, but two more cranks revealed themselves, cutting off their escape route. Two more cranks appeared, one on the left and one on the right. Thomas recognized all of the cranks except one. The sixth one must have been hiding or something.

"What do you want?" Minho asked threateningly, holding out his knife for them to see.

"It's not about what we want," said the new crank, then he pointed at Thomas, "that one wanted to play a game. But we don't like hide and seek, we like tag."

"You want to play tag?" Minho asked.

"Yes. We chase you and we catch you and we kill you."

"Look, there are more of us than there are of you," Harriet said, "plus we're armed. If you attack us we won't hesitate to kill you. Now let us go."

The crank made a gurgling sound that was probably supposed to be laughter.

"The little girl has a sharp tongue, but our knives are sharper," he said.

Then he lunged at her.

It wasn't a very smart move. Harriet (and the ones standing close to her) simply stepped aside. The crank fell to the ground. It tried to get up but Harriet kicked at it.

The other cranks took their friend's attack as a signal and attacked as well.

Thomas took out the knife from his pocket and got ready to defend himself.

The cranks were not particularly smart or well-balanced, but they also had nothing to lose, they only wanted to kill.

A crank holding a big shard of glass ran towards Thomas.

Thomas waited for the right moment and when the crank was about to run him through he ducked, grabbed the crank's legs and pulled them to the side. The crank fell to the ground, its head connecting with a rock. It lay still, dazed, but not unconscious. The knife felt heavy in Thomas' hand. He knew he should kill the crank, if he didn't it would get up and it wouldn't hesitate to kill Thomas and his friends. But he couldn't bring himself to do it. It reminded him too much of what he'd done to Newt in the simulation. He knew it was the best thing to do, the only thing to do, but it felt wrong.

His hesitation almost killed him. The crank had clawed its way up. It had lost its weapon but it still had fists. It punched Thomas. The force of the blow made Thomas stumble and fall. The crank grabbed hold of him, falling to the ground with him. Thomas' knife had fallen out of his hand. The crank growled, displaying its yellowed teeth. Thomas tried to push it away, but it was too strong. He used one hand to try to keep the crank from biting his face off, he used his other hand to try to find his knife. He felt around on the ground and didn't find it.

When he was sure he had lost, his hand felt something smooth and cold. It was the blade of the knife. He grabbed the handle and stabbed the blade into the cranks throat. He yanked it out and cringed as a spray of blood hit him. He pushed the now motionless crank off of himself and stood up shakily. He stared at the knife in his hand. There was so much blood. He had killed people before, but not like that.

He forced himself to stop thinking about it and took in the scene around him instead.

Half the other cranks were incapacitated, the ones who were still fighting were losing and would soon be defeated. There was only one crank who appeared to be having any luck. It was less clumsy than the others, and even more vicious. Thomas watched as it ducked to avoid an attack from Sonya, picked up a rock, and then slammed it into Sonya's temple. She fell to the ground and didn't get up. Her eyes were closed, so she was probably unconscious rather than dead, but Thomas could tell that the hit had caused great damage.

To his surprise, Newt ran over to the crank. He gave a roar of pure rage and slammed into it. The crank fell to the ground with Newt on top of it. Newt punched it repeatedly in the face until the crank was a very dead, very bloody mess. But he didn't stop, he looked very scary at that moment. Minho grabbed his friend by his arm and tried to pull him away, telling him to snap out of it, but Newt didn't care.

Thomas made his way over to them to help. He grabbed Newt's other arm, but his friend was much stronger than him.

"Newt, stop!" Thomas yelled.

To his surprise, it worked. Newt stopped punching the crank and allowed Thomas and Minho to pull him up. He still looked angry and absolutely terrifying. He stared at the crank for a while. He looked disgusted, though whether it was because of the crank or because of what he'd done to it, Thomas couldn't tell.

He turned around, to where Sonya lay, still unconscious, with Harriet and a few of the others from group B hovering over her.

Without saying anything Newt walked away from the group, sitting down on a boulder with his back turned on them. Thomas wanted to go after him, but he knew it would be best to let his friend have a few minutes to calm down before going to him.

The adrenaline was starting to leave Thomas, he felt tired, hungry and scared. Last night he'd felt like everything was great, but now they had been attacked by cranks, Sonya was hurt, and Newt was losing control of himself.

And the worst thing was that he knew that it was just the start, everything would get even worse soon, he was sure of it.

What he wasn't sure about was whether he'd survive it or not. He had already been close to getting killed by a crank because of his hesitation. He knew that he would have to toughen up if he wanted to live to see the end of the trial. The time for hesitation was over.


	20. Search

CHAPTER 20.

Group A and group B were once again separated. The gladers had offered to go search for food. Mostly because they needed food, but also because they felt like they were intruding. Sonya had yet to wake up, and many of the girls were nearly reduced to tears. They had emptied every backpack of books. Then they rifled through them in search of something useful. Harriet had been furiously turning the pages of a book on first aid while muttering 'useless' over and over again, evidently not finding the information she was looking for.

Aris was crouching next to Sonya, using a torn off piece of his shirtsleeve to dab at the wound on her head, which was bleeding. Thomas had slightly misjudged where the blow had landed, it hadn't hit her temple directly, it was more like the side of her head. He was still concerned. He didn't know how much damage had been caused, but he was pretty sure it was severe, which was supported by the fact she hadn't woken up.

The gladers didn't know what to do. They stood there awkwardly for a while before Frypan suggested they go search for food instead. The gladers gladly took the chance to leave, all except Newt, who was still sitting facing away from them. None of them were sure if it was safe to talk to him, so they didn't take him with them. Minho offered to stay with him.

Nobody argued, they said their goodbyes and left. The other group didn't even seem to notice that they were leaving.

Without Newt and Minho there were only seven of them. They split into three groups and walked off in different directions, agreeing to meet up after an hour and go back to the others together.

Thomas, who knew the least about gathering food, was paired with Frypan, who knew the most.

In the glade they had mainly eaten the crops they grew and the animals they slaughtered, but there were apparently a bunch of herbs and other stuff that grew in the deadheads.

Of course, the situation was entirely different, the plants in this forest were not the same as the ones in the deadheads, and they needed more than just a few herbs.

Each group had taken a book on edible foods. Thomas hadn't read either of them, but Frypan had apparently memorized one of the books. He hadn't had time for the other one, but he'd undoubtedly have that one memorized too if given some time.

They had taken the books with them there. The other two groups took one book each, leaving Thomas and Frypan with only the latter boy's knowledge as guidance.

They walked to the left, the others having chosen right and ahead. Thomas let Frypan take the lead since he was the one who knew what to look for. Thomas memorized their path, making a mental map.

After a few minutes of walking Thomas was starting to feel worried. What if they didn't find anything? He wasn't sure what season it was. It could have been fall, spring, or a mild winter. Or maybe it was actually summer and it was just really cold where they were. He hoped the plants in the area had adapted to the cold and would be able to grow in it, otherwise, they probably wouldn't find anything.

After a few more minutes of walking, Frypan stopped.

"Did you find something?" Thomas asked.

"Yeah," Frypan pointed at a cluster of leaves on the ground.

Thomas reached for the closest plant to pluck it.

"Thomas, wait!" Frypan said, but it was too late.

As soon as Thomas touched the thing, his hand erupted in pain. He quickly snatched his hand away.

"Stinging nettles?" He asked. He wasn't exactly an expert on plants, but he knew what a stinging nettle was, even though he hadn't recognized it.

Frypan nodded.

"They're edible, but you have to boil them, otherwise they'll sting you if you touch them."

"Yeah, I noticed," Thomas said grumpily. The stinging in his hand was starting to fade, but he still felt embarrassed for not recognizing the nettles.

"Do you have a knife?" Frypan asked.

"Yeah, why?"

"We can use it to dig up the nettles without having to touch them," Frypan explained, "and then we just put them in my backpack."

"Right, but what's the point of taking them? I mean, we don't have anything to boil them in, so we won't be able to eat them," Thomas pointed out.

"We'll figure it out," Frypan promised.

Thomas sighed unhappily and took out the knife from his pocket.

He dug it into the ground under one of the plants, severing the roots connecting the plant to the ground while trying his best not to touch the nettles.

Frypan went off somewhere to look for more edible plants while Thomas worked. He knew they should probably stay together in case something happened, but Frypan promised to stay close, if anything happened he could just call for help.

It was harder than he'd thought, the dirt was hard-packed and impossible to cut through in some places, in other places it was muddy and easy as it was to get through, Thomas got mud all over himself.

When he'd finally managed to cut one of the plants loose he put it in Frypan's backpack, which had been left behind for him since he'd left his own backpack with the others. It wasn't easy to get the plant into the backpack since he couldn't touch it, he had to balance it on the knife.

Thomas repeated the process until the backpack was halfway full. Partly because that seemed enough, and partly because his hands hurt from all the times he'd accidentally touched the nettles.

He stood up and tried in vain to brush the dirt off his clothes. He checked his watch and saw that it was twenty minutes until they were supposed to meet up with the other gladers.

He had no idea where Frypan was. He couldn't hear anything that wasn't normal in a forest, there were no sounds of movement. Frypan wouldn't have gone that far, but if he was nearby Thomas should be able to hear him, shouldn't he?

He decided to wait for him. He looked around the area. There didn't appear to be anything edible there. Just some ferns and a few patches of mushrooms that Thomas guessed were poisonous.

After ten minutes he was starting to get anxious. Frypan should have been back by then, but there was no indication that he was nearby.

Thomas started tapping his foot on the ground while trying to figure out what to do.

He could go looking for him, but he didn't know where he could have gone, he guessed he'd gone further left but he didn't know for sure.

After five more minutes had passed Thomas had had enough of waiting. He called his friend's name several times, and when there was no response he began walking around the area.

Frypan was nowhere to be found.

Then, suddenly, he heard someone shouting his name. At first, he thought it was Frypan, but as the voice called a second time he recognized it as belonging to Gally.

"Over here!" Thomas called.

There were sounds of heavy footsteps and the crunch of leaves being stepped on. Then Gally appeared, the four other gladers behind him.

"What's going on?" Gally asked, "first you didn't meet up with us like we decided and then we heard you shouting."

"Frypan's wandered off somewhere and I can't find him," Thomas explained.

"You were supposed to stick together! What if he's stumbled into another group of cranks?"

"To be fair, if he encountered a group of cranks I don't think he would have stood a better chance if I was with him," Thomas pointed out. Gally glared at him.

"Sorry," Thomas said hastily, "look, I know we should have stayed together, but he said he wouldn't go far."

"Well, it looks like he did anyway," Gally grumbled, "and now we'll have to go look for him."

They spread out two and two. They agreed to meet up after half an hour, but the time passed quickly and they still hadn't found any trace of him. There were no footprints, no stepped-on leaves what they could see. Nothing. Thomas was getting really worried.

After twenty-five minutes had passed, Thomas glanced at Gally, who was running beside him and didn't look like he was about to stop anytime soon.

"We should go back," Thomas said.

Gally muttered something under his breath that Thomas didn't catch, though he guessed it was something insulting, but he turned and ran in the direction they'd come from. Thomas followed, trying not to fall behind. It was a bit humiliating, seeing as Thomas used to be a runner, but his mind was too preoccupied for it to really bother him.

They arrived at their meeting place a few minutes late, but only one of the two other groups were there.

"I take it you didn't find anything," Thomas said.

One of the boys nodded.

"No trace of him. Maybe we should go get the others,"

"We should wait until Alex and Doug get back," Gally said.

So they waited. And waited.

"What if they went missing too?" Thomas asked, trying not to sound scared. He suspected it was WICKED's doing. Probably an attempt to scare them. But what if it wasn't? What if there were a bunch of cranks lurking in the forest, watching and waiting for an opportunity to pounce?

"We should really go back to the others now," said the same glader that had suggested it in the first place.

"You two do that," Thomas said, "Gally and I can wait here in case they return." He looked to Gally, to see if he would argue with him, but he said nothing.

The other two didn't say anything either, they simply ran off to get the others.

Thomas and Gally agreed that something didn't feel right. They stood back to back, so they wouldn't get jumped from behind. Thomas had taken his knife out. The blade was dirty, covered in half-dried mud. Thomas peeled off the layers of dirt. It was a welcome distraction. Sure, his already grimy hands got even dirtier, but at least it took enough of his focus to keep him from thinking of all the horrible things that could have happened.

If he hadn't been sure before, he certainly was at that moment. Someone or something was out there with them, taking them when they were too few to be able to defend themselves.

"They should have been back by now," Gally murmured from behind him.

Thomas didn't respond. There was nothing to say.

He felt like he was back in the maze, the night he'd gotten stuck there after the walls closed, scared to death and waiting for a griever to jump out from behind a corner and kill him. Knowing WICKED, he suspected it was intentional. He wouldn't be entirely surprised if a griever _did_ jump out from behind somewhere.

Suddenly there were sounds coming from somewhere far away.

As the source of the sounds got closer, Thomas heard names being shouted. His name, and the names of the other gladers. He recognized the voice as Minho's. He could hear Newt's voice too, though it was fainter.

"Over here!" Thomas called. He ran in his friends' direction, Gally following right behind him.

He'd reached them soon, slowing to a stop once he did.

"You were gone so long, we thought something had happened to you," Minho said in an accusing voice. He looked behind Thomas and the relief that had started to show on his face vanished.

"Where are the others?" He asked.

"We don't know, they just disappeared," Thomas said.

"How did they disappear?" Newt asked.

"First Frypan went off alone. He was supposed to stay close, but we can't find him anywhere. And then-" but Thomas was interrupted.

"You let him go alone? Are you crazy? There's a reason why you're supposed to stay together in situations like these!" Minho said angrily, "and what happened to the rest of them? Did they go off on their own too?"

"No, of course not, they went two and two," Thomas said indignantly.

Minho was about to say something, but Gally beat him to it.

"Shouldn't we focus on finding them now?" He asked.

"We should all go back to group B, then we can go in one big search party," Minho decided. He turned on his heel and started running, the other three gladers followed.

Their decision to go to the other group ended up proving to be a big mistake Once they heard the shouting and sounds of fighting it was too late. The four of them had already run into the clearing.

Group B had gotten into a fight against a gang of people that outnumbered them two to one. They didn't look like cranks, but that didn't exactly make the situation better. He noticed that they didn't fight to kill, merely to incapacitate. They were most likely going to kidnap them or something. They must've already done so to the other gladers.

Thomas turned back in the direction he'd come from. They were not going to win the fight, that much was clear, maybe if he managed to hide, he could see what the strangers wanted with them and he could rescue them if needed.

But it was too late, they had been spotted.

Several of the strangers ran towards them. Thomas didn't see any weapons, but some of their companions were fighting with nasty-looking knives so Thomas didn't rule out the possibility that they were armed.

A man ran in Thomas' direction at full speed. The man was slightly shorter than Thomas, but he was also much more muscular.

Thomas sidestepped while grabbing for the knife he'd put in his pocket once more.

The man grabbed Thomas by his backpack and yanked him backward. Thomas almost cut off his own fingers with his knife. He let the weapon fall to the ground as he struggled to get out of the backpack. Once he was free from it he turned and shoved the man hard enough to make him take a step back. He clenched his fists in preparation, but before he could do anything something hard collided with the back of his head. The force of the blow, combined with the surprise and the pain made him fall to his knees. He tried to get up, but he felt dizzy, and the person who had hit him stepped around to stand in front of him. A kick was aimed at Thomas' face and he fell onto his back, a new pain had flared up in his cheek. The person put their foot on Thomas' throat, almost hard enough to suffocate him.

He blinked furiously to get rid of the dark spots that were obscuring his vision.

He looked up at his assailant and to his surprise he recognized her.

"Brenda?" He croaked, but his voice was too low for anyone to hear.

Her expression was pained as if she was trying to apologize. But Thomas wondered if he'd imagined it because Brenda's expression was suddenly cold and disdainful. She removed her foot from his throat. Then she grabbed him by the arm and pulled him to his feet roughly. She shoved him at the man who'd first attacked him. He took hold of Thomas' arms and held them behind his back in a painful grip.

"This one is their leader. Take him to the boss," she said, her voice mirroring her expression.

Then she turned away from him and walked off, leaving Thomas in a state of absolute shock.


	21. Capture

I'm sorry it took so long, I had writers block. This is kind of a filler chapter, but next chapter is going to be more interesting. That being said, I hope this chapter is at least somewhat interesting and that you'll enjoy reading it.

Chapter 21.

Thomas stared at Brenda, wishing she'd turn around and explain what was going on. He knew she worked for WICKED, but he'd thought she was on his side. Was she waiting for the right moment to turn on the strangers like she had done to the people at WICKED in the simulation? Thomas knew he'd have to be patient, but not knowing was unbearable.

As Thomas looked around at their attackers he noticed that they weren't wearing the usual uniforms of the WICKED-guards. Their attire was a blend of normal clothes and armor, everything looking worn down and dirty.

Thomas guessed they were working for WICKED but pretending they weren't.

That made more sense than some random group of people deciding to attack a bunch of teenagers that they just happened to stumble upon out in the forest of what appeared to be the middle of nowhere.

Thomas' speculations were interrupted by a yell.

He looked in the direction it had come from and saw Harriet, struggling furiously but unsuccessfully to break free from the grasp of a large man. But her yell hadn't been directed at him.

"Be careful!" She shouted at one of the other strangers.

Said strange held up the still unconscious Sonya and shook her as if that would wake her up. Brenda had made her way over to them to see what all the fuss was about.

"What's going on?" She demanded, looking from Harriet to Sonya, her frown deepening when she saw the latter. She glared at the man holding her.

"Did you kill her? I told you not to do that! You know we need as many of them as we can get!" She said.

"I didn't do nothin'! she was like this when I found her!" He protested.

"She's not dead!" Harriet said angrily, "but she will be soon if you keep shaking her like that!"

The man stopped shaking her. He put his finger to her throat to feel for a pulse.

"She's alive," he confirmed, looking at Brenda as if waiting for instructions.

It struck Thomas that Brenda was the leader of the group, despite being younger than most of the others.

She turned to Harriet.

"What's wrong with her?" She asked.

"We don't know. A crank hit her in the head with a rock a few hours ago," she responded, looking torn between being grateful that Brenda stepped in and being angry at her for attacking them.

"And she's been like this ever since?"

"No, she woke up a while ago, but she just muttered incomprehensibly and passed out again."

Brenda looked at Sonya and pondered a few seconds before making a decision.

"We'll take her with us, we might be able to keep her alive long enough to use her," Brenda said.

"Use her for what?" Harriet demanded.

Brenda ignored her.

"Come on, let's go!" She called.

Their captors led them through the forest. No one spoke, except for the occasional 'walk faster', from the strangers.

Thomas tried to figure out what was happening. Brenda had said that they

needed as many of them as they could get. What did she mean by that? Maybe WICKED wanted to keep as many of them alive as possible so they'd be more likely to find a cure. Thomas guessed that was it.

He wondered what the point of interrupting the trial was. Maybe they weren't interrupting the trial, it was possible that they were doing it as some kind of test.

Or maybe, unlikely as it seemed, it wasn't WICKED. Maybe the strangers were part of another organization that was gathering immunes for their own research. Thomas didn't know how he felt about that idea. He didn't want to be put through a new set of trials, and they didn't have all the time in the world to find a cure, but he wanted to be free from WICKED, more than almost anything. They had taken his memories, his friends, they had almost taken his life several times. The worst part of it was that they didn't show any regret of what they had done. They acted like the gladers were nothing more than test subjects, lab rats. Thomas wanted to destroy the organization and everyone working for them. The only thing that kept him from doing that was the fact that his best friend had the flare. And, as ashamed as it made him feel, that was barely enough. In the simulation, it hadn't been enough. He knew that he was being selfish. He didn't particularly care about saving the world. It was just a bonus of saving his friend, not his main priority.

But he was getting ahead of himself. He needed to focus on the current situation, not on some fantasy that would almost certainly never become reality.

Thomas' hands had been tied together behind his back, so he couldn't check his watch, but he didn't need to know the time to know that they had been walking for a long time. He was starting to get tired and his body felt sore, but that pain was nothing compared to the hunger that was gnawing at him, seeming to grow with every step. He hoped their captors would be decent enough to give them food once they had finished walking.

After walking through a particularly thick grove of trees they stopped. The man who had been leading Thomas let go of him suddenly.

"Stay there," he muttered. Then he and a few of the other strangers went over to a pile of tree branches and started tossing them aside. At first, Thomas wondered what they were doing, they could just step around it, they didn't need to clear the path. But then he realized that they weren't going to keep walking, there was something under the branches.

That 'something' was soon revealed to be a large, metallic trapdoor.

Brenda pushed past the others and started fiddling with something in the corner of the trapdoor. There was a small 'click' and a cylinder –maybe five centimeters in diameter- popped up. The thing was covered with what must've been at least a hundred tiny buttons. Brenda crouched next to the cylinder, her body obscuring it from Thomas' sight, most likely on purpose, and started pressing the buttons, judging by the numerous clicking sounds. It wasn't really a necessary precaution since Thomas was pretty sure he wouldn't have been able to memorize the code judging by the number of buttons.

There was another, louder 'click' and the trapdoor shot open, Brenda stepped back just in time to avoid getting hit in the face by it.

Someone removed the rope tying his hands together and shoved Thomas forward.

"Go inside," said a hoarse voice. Thomas stepped closer to the door reluctantly, his friends following closely.

Once Thomas was close enough to look down the opening he saw nothing but darkness and a ladder leading into it.

Brenda took hold of the ladder and climbed down without hesitation.

Thomas watched her disappear into the darkness.

He got shoved again. It was a hard shove, Thomas almost stumbled and fell into the abyss.

"Go inside," repeated the same hoarse voice he'd heard before. Thomas carefully put his hands and feet on the ladder. It was metallic and cold as ice. It made an unsettling screeching sound, making Thomas wonder just how stable it was.

Since he didn't want to get shoved again he started climbing, gripping the ladder tightly.

He was engulfed in darkness much faster than should have been possible seeing as it was relatively sunny outside. He then realized that he wasn't climbing straight down, the ladder was leaning slightly.

Climbing down a ladder in the dark was pretty scary, Thomas had no idea how wide the hole was, he had no idea if it was a narrow tunnel or a gigantic underground cave.

He could hear the sounds of his friends climbing above him, he could feel it too, the movement made the ladder rock slightly as it groaned in protest at their combined weight.

Just as he was starting to wonder how much farther the ladder went he stepped off the rung he was standing on to reach the next, but he felt nothing. He felt around with his foot but there was nothing there. He went further down, using only his hands to climb, but the ladder had ended. He couldn't feel a floor either. He wasn't sure what to do. Was he supposed to let go of the ladder and fall the rest of the way? He wondered if it was some sort of trap, designed to kill all of them. But that couldn't be it, could it? Brenda had gone before him, and he hadn't heard screaming or anything else that indicated something was wrong.

Before he could make up his mind the person above him stepped on his hands.

Thomas instinctively let go of the ladder, clutching his poor fingers to his chest.

A scream formed in his throat as he realized his mistake, but he didn't fall for long. His feet had actually only been a few decimeters above the floor. Had he known that he could have easily landed on his feet, but in his terror, he was unprepared for the landing and hit the floor with his back first.

The floor was hard stone, not comfortable to fall on.

"Tommy, what happened?" He heard Newt's voice asking. He had probably heard the thump of Thomas' failed landing.

"I hit the floor," Thomas answered.

He stood up quickly and backed away from the place he'd fallen to avoid his friend landing on him. He used his hands to feel around so he didn't back into a wall.

He didn't feel a wall, but he felt something else, it was someone's arm. At first, he didn't realize that it was just Brenda, and for that short moment, he was terrified.

The arm was suddenly gone, the person it belonged to having moved away.

Just as suddenly a sharp light was pointed at his face. He shut his eyes and covered them with his still aching hands.

He removed his hands from his face and squinted at the light.

It wasn't directed at his face anymore, so he was able to open his eyes.

He saw Brenda, holding a flashlight. The beam of light was directed at a hole in the roof, where Thomas had just come from.

Newt jumped off the ladder, landing on his feet and going over to where Thomas was standing.

"Sorry for stepping on your fingers," he apologized quietly.

Thomas was too busy looking at the room they were in to respond.

The room was small and the walls and roof were made out of metal. It was damp and cold, and it smelled like dirt. The only thing worth noting was the corridor behind him, which went on for a few meters before there was a turn to the side that hid the rest of the corridor.

Brenda stood still as a statue, directing the flashlight at the entrance. The room was starting to fill up as more people entered. When one of their other captors came into the room Brenda handed him the flashlight and told Thomas and his friends to come with her. She went into the corridor and they followed. Since she didn't have the flashlight anymore it quickly got hard to see once more. Once they turned the corner of the corridor they couldn't see anything at all. But they didn't stop. Thomas could hear the sound of Brenda's shoes hitting the stone floor, so he followed, hoping she knew where they were going. The corridor shifted direction twice. The first time it happened, Thomas walked face first into the wall. After that incident, he held his hands out in front of himself like a mummy, which would have looked stupid if the complete darkness hadn't prevented everyone from seeing anything, but he didn't walk into another wall, so at least it was effective.

"Stop," Brenda said after a few minutes of walking. Thomas obeyed, standing in the darkness and waiting for whatever was about to happen.

Without warning, Thomas was blinded for the second time that day. This time it wasn't a flashlight, though, it was a door that Brenda must have opened. The light wasn't as strong this time around, so Thomas just had to blink a few times to get used to it.

The room in front of him appeared to be a long hallway, with several doors along the sides. The hallway was made entirely out of concrete, with fluorescent lights in the ceiling. There were no decorations on the walls unless you counted the five security cameras and the seven devices that looked like gun barrels and probably were gun barrels, that were spread throughout the room, near the ceiling and out of reach.

Brenda went inside and Thomas followed.

"I wouldn't try anything if I were you," She warned them, with a small wave at the devices, proving Thomas' theory on what they were.

Once he'd entered the room he saw that there were another one of the weapons positioned above the door, pointing right at him. Thomas' body tingled with adrenaline, he wanted to run away, but he knew that would probably not end well for him, so he did as instructed. Brenda knocked on a door on the far side of the hallway. A voice called something in response, but the door blocked most of the sound. Brenda must've taken that as permission to open the door because that's what she did.

Brenda didn't walk inside, she held the door open and pointed at Thomas.

"In," she said. Thomas edged closer to the opening, his friends made to follow.

"No, not you, only him," she said

"Any day now," she said impatiently to Thomas.

Newt began protesting, but Thomas shook his head and his friend's complaints stopped.

Thomas, having no other choice, entered the room. The door closed after him.

The room looked like an office, albeit a rather dirty and shabby one.

And behind a small desk was a man that Thomas -to his surprise- recognized.

"Vince?"


	22. Complication

Chapter 22.

"How'd you know my name, kid?" Vince asked, peering at Thomas suspiciously.

"Um…" was Thomas' response. In his moment of surprise, he had forgotten that he hadn't met the real Vince. After the simulation was over he had just assumed that Vince and the right arm had been made up. It didn't make any sense for WICKED to introduce the already rebellious gladers to a group of people that was basically the anti-WICKED.

But here he was, and he had to come up with a believable reason for knowing Vince's name because he didn't think 'I met you before in Denver, except it wasn't actually Denver because it was in a simulation' sounded believable. Besides, he didn't know the man's intentions, so it would be best to play it safe for the time being.

"A friend of mine told me about you," Thomas said finally. It wasn't a lie. After all, Gally had told him and his friends about the right arm and Vince before they met him. (Thomas wasn't really sure whether or not Gally counted as a friend. They had started off as enemies, but once Gally had stopped acting like a jerk they had started getting along. Maybe they weren't friends yet, but perhaps sometime in the future that would change.)

"Oh really," Vince said, looking, if possible, even more suspicious, "what friend? One of the kids you were with when we found you?"

"He wasn't in our group," Thomas said, still not technically lying. Gally was in their group _at the moment_ , but he hadn't been with them for a while after the maze, which was what he referred to.

"How convenient for you," Vince noted. Thomas said nothing.

"Well, it appears you already know some things. I'd like to hear what else you know," Vince said.

Thomas remained silent for as long as he dared, deciding what he should say.

"You are with the right arm, correct?" Thomas said, but before he could get an answer he continued speaking.

"You found out that we were out in the forest somehow. You either want us to join forces with you or keep us as prisoners to force WICKED to pay ransom to get us back."

"So you admit that you are working with WICKED?" Vince asked, looking rather triumphant.

"I assumed you already knew that, and even if you didn't, you would probably figure it out sooner or later"

Vince looked less triumphant.

"It's as you say," Vince said, changing the topic, "I'm part of the right arm. We recently gained two colleagues that used to work for WICKED and informed us about your location, which was thankfully close to one of our bases. As for what you said about what we want with you, you were almost right. You see, we need you for a plan of ours, but we won't let you join our ranks just yet."

Two new colleagues that used to work for WICKED. He had to be talking about Brenda and Jorge. Thomas hadn't seen Jorge, but wherever Brenda was, he was always there too.

Thomas wondered why they had defected from WICKED. He would hopefully be able to speak with Brenda later so he could hear what she had to say.

"What is this 'plan' you need us for?" Thomas asked.

"As I'm sure you're aware, WICKED has a very large budget for their little experiments,"  
"Money. That's what you're after?"

"No, not money, money has little value in the world nowadays. What we're interested in is equipment, the kind of equipment WICKED has. When the flare started WICKED was given the task of curing it. The remaining governments made sure money wouldn't be an issue, that way the people at WICKED were able to get state-of-the-art lab equipment. Unfortunately, they were the only ones. But they have long since proven that they won't create the cure we need."

"Wait, are you saying that you intend to find the cure instead?" Thomas asked in surprise.

"Exactly, unlike WICKED, we have the right priorities and the right methods, what we need is the equipment."

"What do you mean by 'right priorities'?" Thomas asked. They both wanted the cure, right? So why would they have different priorities? Different methods he could understand (though it sounded slightly worrying), but different priorities?

"I won't give you the details since I don't know them myself. Just know that working with WICKED won't get you what you want."

"Fine, then can you at least tell me what other 'methods' you were referring to?

"Maybe I will later on if you cooperate with us," Vince said, giving Thomas an almost pitying look. That, along with the way he said it, made it clear that he was not going to tell Thomas anything. That made Thomas feel even more worried, but he doubted he would be getting an answer if he kept asking for it, so he decided to focus on it later.

"You told me what your goal is, but I want to know what my friends and I have to do with you achieving it," Thomas said.

"My informants told me that you and your friends were headed for one of WICKED's facilities, is that true?"

Thomas nodded quickly, eager to hear what Vince had to say.

"We have made plans to take the building over for a long time. It holds all the equipment we need, and it's supposedly not well guarded on the inside. Getting inside is the only issue. The only way to get there is if someone on the inside lets you in."

"So you want us to go there and let you in?" Thomas guessed.

"Very good," Vince said.

"And why would we do that?" Thomas asked. He didn't like WICKED, but it seemed like a better option than the right arm. He didn't want to interrupt WICKED's (possibly) almost completed research. If WICKED hadn't created a cure after all this time with unlimited resources, how could the right arm manage to do it? They didn't exactly resemble scientists.

"Because if you don't," Vince began, with a rather nasty look on his face, "I will kill your friends."

"No you won't," Thomas said calmly, remembering what Brenda had said earlier, "I heard one of your colleagues say that you need us alive."

"Well, it's true that we need you alive. The ones who are immune, that is."

"We're all immune," Thomas lied.

"Is that so?" Vince asked. He knew that Thomas was lying, he could see it on his face.

"If all of you are immune, then why did my co-workers discover that two of your friends had VC32L13-pills in their packs?"

Thomas was confused at first, before realizing that VC3-whatever-it-was must be the name of the pills used to slow the spread of the flare, the ones that Newt had been given earlier. The second person must be that girl in group B that also had the flare.

"they are mentally unstable, they need those pills to stay calm," Thomas said.

"So they are close to the gone, then?" Vince asked. Thomas should probably have worded his excuse differently.

"What? No. They're not cranks!" He insisted, though he knew there was no point in persisting.

"If you don't do what I tell you to do I will kill them," Vince said, ignoring Thomas' protests.

Thomas didn't doubt that he meant it. After all, Vince wouldn't have much use of two non-immunes that would soon succumb to the flare, and there were two of them, so he wouldn't have to worry about not having anything to threaten Thomas with if he killed one of them.

"Fine, I'll help you," Thomas said.

"Good, you'll leave tomorrow with… let me think… four of your friends and ten of mine."

"Wait, four of them?" Thomas asked in surprise. He had thought all of them would be going, though he realized how stupid he'd been to think that. If all of them had gone together they might have been able to overpower their captors or warn the people in the WICKED-facility once they were all safely inside. But only four of them didn't make sense either. Unless, of course, Brenda and Jorge had told them WICKED's plans, and they had planned to have all except the five of them die. Would they do that? The rat man had said they wouldn't, but he wasn't exactly trustworthy. But why would they do that? Then they would only have five test subjects left, that seemed risky. Thomas wondered if they really were as close to finding a cure as they said or if they were just getting desperate.

"Yes, four of them," Vince said "and you get to pick one of them. You see, I want to make sure you understand that I'm serious about the consequences of not obeying my orders. You will take one of the cranks with you, in case you try something funny, so you can see for yourself that I'm not fooling around. So which one is it? Boy-crank or girl-crank?"

"N-" Thomas began to say, but he interrupted himself with a faked coughing fit. Vince would expect him to pick the one that meant the most to him and Thomas didn't want him to know that. He kept coughing for as long as he dared to give himself time to think.

"I pick Naomi," Thomas said finally. He doubted that was her actual name, but it was the first girl-name he could think of.

"It looks like she's staying then," Vince said, looking rather pleased with himself for having tricked Thomas, blissfully unaware that he was the one being tricked.

"What? But you said-" Thomas pretended to complain.

"And here I thought you were smart, kid," Vince said, then his smug smile turned into a frown. Thomas tensed, had Vince seen through his truck.

"Tell me, what's the boy's name?"

"Isaac," Thomas lied. If he said his friend's real name Vince would know that that's what he'd been about to say. The made-up name was from Newt's namesake, only it was the first name rather than the surname. Maybe not the best option, but it was the best that Thomas could come up within two seconds. Besides, he doubted Vince knew about the way they were named.

"As I said, the girl stays, the boy goes," Vince said, now convinced.

"Fine, is there anything else you need to tell me?" Thomas asked, trying his best to sound grumpy (which wasn't very difficult in his current situation).

"No, there's nothing else you need to know," Vince said. He pointed at the door, which Thomas took as a sign to get out. Where he was supposed to go was unclear to him, but he got up reluctantly and walked towards the exit. He grabbed the door handle pushed at the door, which was even heavier than it looked.

When he had finally managed to get it open he saw that Brenda was standing on the other side of it, arms crossed and tapping her foot against the floor in an almost comical way.

"Come on, let's go," she said.

Thomas exited the doorway and let the door slam shut as he let go of it.

"Brenda, how did you get here?" He whispered, as he didn't know if the room was bugged as well as monitored.

"How do you know my name?" She asked in an equally silent, though shocked tone.

"What do you mean? Don't you remember me?" Thomas asked.

Brenda frowned.

"I haven't met you before today."

"But you knew I was the leader of the group," Thomas argued.

"I've heard about you, but I haven't met you before," Brenda insisted.

"But-"

" _Let's go."_ Brenda grabbed Thomas by the arm and led him down the corridor at a brisk pace.

Was she lying? It was possible. Maybe WICKED had sent her there to spy, or maybe they had planned for the right arm to catch them and sent Brenda to make sure nothing went wrong. In that case, it would be best not to reveal that he knew her.

So he let her pull him down the hallway, stopped walking when she did, and then waited obediently as she tapped in a code on a small screen next to the door handle.

A small click signaled that the door had been unlocked and Brenda opened it.

Thomas entered before she could tell him to. He turned towards her, maybe to say goodbye, maybe to see if her face showed any signs of knowing him. Before he could do either the door closed, hitting him in the nose as it did.

He yelped and took a step back, yelping once more as he stepped on something. He spun around and saw Teresa standing there. He must have stepped on her foot.

"Sorry," he muttered. He brought his hand up to his nose to feel for any damage. It hurt, but there was at least no blood.

Thomas inspected the rest of the room. Everyone was there, sitting or standing in the empty room. Speaking of the room, it looked like a dungeon, built completely out of cement with no windows and a weakly glowing light bulb in the ceiling was the only source of light.

Teresa crossed her arms and looked at Thomas demandingly.

"well, what's going on?"


	23. Resentment

Chapter 23

Thomas explained their current situation. He was careful not to voice his own opinions on the matter, seeing as the room (or rather, cell) might be bugged. He just repeated what had been said to him.

"So five of us will be going," Thomas concluded, "me, three others that haven't been decided yet, and Isaac."

He locked eyes with Newt, who had been looking at Thomas intently all throughout his explanation. Newt looked puzzled for a few seconds before giving Thomas a small nod, thankfully having caught on.

Some of the others looked briefly confused, but they were smart enough not to ask any questions.

Good, their reactions wouldn't mean anything to anyone watching them, they would just assume they were thinking about all the new information they'd received.

Once the group had had some time to process the information they swarmed around Thomas, asking him in hushed voices about the conversation, if there was anything he'd forgotten to mention, what his plan was.

Their behavior was understandable, but it annoyed him nonetheless. He pushed past the crowd, looking for one person in particular.

He found her standing in a corner of the room, staring at the ceiling and appearing deep in thought.

"Harriet," Thomas said in an attempt to gain the girl's attention.

Her gaze shifted to land on him. "What?"

"I just wanted to let you know," Thomas began in a low voice, "that they know about the non-immunes in the group."

He hadn't told the group about that, he hadn't wanted to risk revealing the fact that he'd been lying to Vince, or let the poor girl that would now have to be referred to as Naomi know that she was being held hostage and risked getting shot if Thomas didn't obey Vince's orders.

"Yes, Isaac and…" Harriet said, deliberately trailing off.

"Naomi," Thomas finished.

He trusted Harriet to spread the information. She, as the leader of group B, knew which one of the girls they were talking about, unlike Thomas.

Thomas was about to leave, but then he noticed something, or more accurately, someone, or even more accurately, the absence of someone.

"Where's Sonya?"

"I'm not sure, we were all shoved in here except for her, and I didn't notice before it was too late. I'm assuming they're trying to fix her, but I don't know," Harriet explained, her voice cracking with emotion at the last word. She sat down on the floor heavily, as if her legs could no longer support her, leaning against the wall. Her face was set in a worried look.

"She'll come back," Thomas reassured her, knowing as he said it that it'd make no difference.

Harriet nodded absently.

Thomas decided against saying something in an attempt to make her feel better, he was not very skilled at consoling people and he figured Harriet wanted to be alone.

He turned away to see that most of his friends had gathered in groups of two or three, standing with their heads close together and whispering. It would seem suspicious to anyone watching, after all, why would they whisper if they had nothing to hide, but it couldn't be helped, they had a lot to discuss and they couldn't do that out loud.

He made his way over to Minho and Newt, who stood together and appeared to be waiting for him.

'"Do we all get new names?"' Was the first question, whispered to him by Minho.

Thomas shook his head and proceeded to explain the circumstances of the name change and the hostage situation.

"Sorry, mate," Newt said guiltily.

"It wouldn't have mattered either way," Minho reasoned, "even if they didn't know about you, they would still have most of the group here as hostages."

"except they need those hostages, they can't kill them. That group B-girl and I, we're disposable, we would be dead already if they couldn't use us as leverage."

"Well, they can't kill you either, because then they wouldn't have anyone to threaten to kill. We can use that to our advantage. We'll come up with _something_ , we always do."

Newt looked at his oldest friend skeptically.

"Shouldn't we at least _consider_ going over to their side before we start talkin' about ways to go back to WICKED?"

Thomas gaped at him, completely taken aback.

"What do you mean 'going over to their side'? They kidnapped us, threatened to kill us, and god knows what they intend to do with us when they don't need our help anymore."

"Are you describing The right arm or WICKED? Because, it sounds to me like they're equally horrible, except WICKED is the one we want to have revenge on, isn't that what all of us want more than anything?"

"No. What we want most right now is getting the shucking cure so we can get the real you back," Minho said in clipped tones.

"The real me?" Newt gave a bitter, hollow kind of laugh that didn't sound at all like him, "what if this is the real me, huh? did you ever consider that?"

He fixed each of them with a look so withering it made Thomas take an involuntary step back.

Minho did not back down, he took a step toward Newt and glared up at him with an equally fierce expression. "I know the real you, and it's not this... this..."

"Monster?" Newt suggested coldly, "lunatic? _crank_?"

Minho didn't respond. They kept glaring at each other, unblinkingly, as if they were having a staring Contest.

They were not the boys that woke up in the glade two years ago, the ones that had run into the maze together, bonded over their shared confusion, become best friends.

No. These were two boys that absolutely loathed each other.

Minho hated the virus that was taking his friend away from him. Newt, in his current irrational state, probably hated everyone and everything, especially the boy standing in front of him, who _dared_ to challenge him.

Thomas tried to step in between them to stop things from escalating, but they were standing too close to each other and neither would budge.

Thomas knew that everyone in the room was watching the two of them, but nobody dared to do anything.

Newt took a step forward, closing the distance between them even more. He tilted his head downwards to avoid breaking eye contact, while Minho had to crane his neck to look at the blond who was now looming over him.

"This is who I am, who I've _always_ _been_ , you're just too stupid to see that, _Minho_ ," Newt said in a dangerously calm voice, except for the last word, which he spat out like it was a curse.

"No, you're the one whose brain is being taken over by a virus, Everything you're saying right now is a lie."

"Actually, this is the first time in years I've told the truth. The old me, the one you insist is the real me, that is the lie."

While Newt's voice was getting lower, silkier, _scarier._

"No!" Minho managed, after opening and closing his mouth several times at a loss for words.

"Yes. you understand now. You always have, haven't you? You've always known deep down that every smile, every laugh, was nothing but an act."

"That's not-"

"Don't deny it, you were the one who went to Alby that day, how could you have told him if you didn't know?"

Minho opened his mouth to say something, but Newt continued speaking before he got the chance.

"You're a coward, Minho. That's why you told Alby, so you wouldn't have to face me, and it must've taken you a while to gather up the courage to do even that, as I recall we made it out of the maze mere seconds before the doors closed. You can't do anything right, can you? A few more seconds, just a few bloody seconds and I would have finally gotten some peace. Do you know how much I suffered every day? And it was all because of you." Thomas stared in wide-eyed horror. Was this really what Newt had been thinking for years? He reminded himself that his friend wasn't in his right state of mind, but that didn't make it much better. The thing that made the flare so much more terrible than any other plague that had ravaged the planet was that it brought out the worst in people. Their darkest thoughts, their most deeply buried resentment, their worst instincts. It was humanity at its lowest point. The virus seemed to have a consciousness, a desire to hurt as many people as it could before it went down along with the person carrying it.

Saying that Newt wasn't the real version of himself was incorrect. It was very much him, albeit the worst part of him.

He wasn't lying. What he was saying was something he'd never say normally, but he'd thought it, no matter how little thought he'd put into it, no matter how much he had ignored it or forgotten it. It was rooted inside him. He was telling the truth in the most hurtful way possible, but that didn't make it any less true.

Minho knew that too. He was still glaring, but his angry expression looked forced, a facade to hide the emotions underneath that were struggling to show themselves. His eye twitched as his fists clenched.

Newt smirked. "Go ahead, punch me, kill me, I don't care, I've been dead for a long time."

But Minho didn't punch him.

"You're right," he said in a shaky voice, "about me being a coward. I knew something was wrong, and I didn't want to face it. After that day in the maze, I thought it was over, you acted like it was, and I wanted to believe you so badly. I'm sorry."

Newt's smirk had disappeared, he hadn't been expecting this. Thomas hadn't either, Minho wasn't someone who apologized, it simply wasn't in his nature.

Minho took a step back, he wasn't glaring at Newt anymore, just looking at him with pity.

Newt, on the other hand, was as angry as Minho had before. He had been sure that Minho would fight him, absolutely certain of his reaction to the provocation, but he had been proved wrong.

"Fight me," he said in a low growl.

Minho shook his head and took another step back.

"You're a coward," Newt said, trying to provoke Minho.

"I know," Minho responded.

Newt had had enough. He swung a fist at Minho. It would have hit the other boy in the face if he hadn't caught Newt's wrist before it connected. The taller boy made a furious sound and tried to punch him with his other hand, but Minho grabbed that one too.

Newt tried furiously to free his hands, but Minho was stronger than he was. Growling in frustration, he aimed a kick at Minho's shin.

Minho grunted in pain and backed away, releasing Newt's hands.

Newt would probably have leapt at him, but Thomas had seen enough of the fight. He ran up behind Newt and grabbed him by the shoulders just as he was about to throw himself at Minho. It resulted in Newt stumbling forward a much shorter distance than he'd intended. But Newt, while not as strong as Minho, managed to throw Thomas off with ease.

Thomas had thought Newt would turn on him, but his focus remained on Minho, who had instinctively scrambled backward as Newt had moved towards him.

The furious boy advanced quickly on his friend, fists at the ready. Minho kept backing away but soon found that he'd backed himself into the wall. To Thomas' relief, Gally and Frypan came to the rescue. They held Newt back as he attempted to attack his friend. Newt struggled and cursed for a while before realizing that it was pointless. They released him once he'd calmed down.

Newt didn't make any further attempts at fighting anyone. He walked past the staring crowd and sat down in the corner of the room, back turned and head bowed, breathing heavily. No one approached him.

It took a while, but eventually, the conversations started up again as if nothing had happened.

"Are you okay?" Thomas asked Minho.

"I'm fine, just… concerned, I guess. How much longer do you think he has?"

Thomas glanced at Newt, who was still in the corner, trembling slightly.

"A few weeks, maybe, if we're lucky."

Minho gave a snort, "since when have we ever been lucky?"

"You have a point." Thomas lowered his voice to a whisper, "we'll have to finish this stupid trial as soon as possible. Vince didn't give me any details, so we'll have to come up with a plan to get away from The right arm as we move along."

Minho nodded. "Unless he was lying, you, Newt, and three others will be going. It's likely they'll pick three of the girls, since there are more of them, so I'm probably staying here, but I suggest you go along with their plan until you get inside WICKED's base, where you can warn the people there and come up with a plan to take the people from The right arm out without alerting anyone here."

"That sounds like a good plan, though there's no telling what the situation will look like." Thomas said, "But the real issue is getting the rest of you out of here. According to what Vince's said, they want to take over the building and use it, that means they'll take you there once the coast is clear."

"And that means one of the people going needs to contact the people here and tell them to come, which they won't do if you attack them. it'll be a miracle if you even take them out before they can report your rebelliousness." Minho continued.

"However, as you probably saw, Brenda is here, Jorge too probably. She seemed to have forgotten ever meeting me, but if she's coming, I might be able to sway her to our side. Once the rest of them are out of commission she can tell Vince that they defeated the WICKED-staff there, he'll bring you over there and we can have an ambush prepared."

"Sounds like a plan," Minho said with a faint smile.


	24. Separation

Chapter 24:

Thomas spent what he estimated to be half an hour pacing the room. His thoughts very starting to get hazy; likely due to hunger, as his latest meal had been the previous day.

He wished The Right Arm had waited with kidnapping them until after they'd finished their scavenging. Getting attacked and captured was bad enough, but to have it happen on an empty stomach? Well, that was just inconsiderate on their captors' part.

And worse still: he was starting to get very thirsty. A human could survive up to three weeks without food; but in the case of water, it was three _days,_ even less if the human in question had been running, walking, and fighting _._ What if The Right Arm didn't think of that? Or if they didn't care?

 _Don't be stupid,_ Thomas chided himself, _they need us, they won't forget._

Of course, he had no idea what kind of _shape_ they needed them in, but it was almost definitely an alive one. Though he supposed they might opt for keeping them in a weakened state to make sure they wouldn't try anything.

Thomas was starting to feel tired. What time was it, anyway? It must have been evening by now, though whether it was late or early he had no idea.

He slumped on the cold floor, leaning against the equally cold wall, and let drowsiness overtake him.

In his dream, he was walking through The Scorch.

Miles upon miles of sand and rubble stretched in every direction.

The sun shone in the middle of the sky, yet Thomas felt as though his whole body had been coated in ice. He wrapped his arms around himself, but he couldn't stop shivering. He clenched his teeth, but they kept chattering. He wanted to curl into a ball on the ground to protect himself from the relentless chill, but he had to keep going. He knew that he was dreaming, but there was nothing he could do about it. He was unable to wake himself up, and he was almost starting to doubt that it was a dream. It was too vivid, and he had a vague feeling of deja vu. It might be because he'd trecked through the scorch before, but it was more than that. Maybe it was part of one of the memories that had been stolen from him by WICKED. He didn't know. All he knew was that he had to keep walking, had to find ... something, someone?

Every once in a while he'd hear something, like a voice, or distant footfalls. He'd turn in a circle, desperately searching for the source of the sounds, but there was never anything there except more sand and rubble.

He kept walking like that for an unknown amount of time. After he'd just passed a collapsed five-story building he heard another sound, louder and clearer than the rest, though still not decipherable. He looked around for good measure and was disappointed (though not surprised) when he didn't see anything besides crushed cement and glass shards mixed with gravely sand. He dismissed it as one of the other incoherent, disembodied voices, but immediately after he'd done that it came again, louder. Thomas stopped walking. The voice repeated itself, becoming more and more insistent. It was coming closer.

Thomas jumped in momentary panic as his arm was shaken roughly by invisible hands.

"Thomas," the voice sounded from right next to his ear.

Thomas' eyes fluttered open as he returned to the real world, in which Minho was crouching over him and shaking his arm impatiently.

"Wake up, you shuckface!" Minho said, evidently not noticing that the shuckface in question was already awake (and not very pleased about being called shuckface).

Thomas lifted his head so he could glare at the other boy. "What is it?"

He was rewarded with a snort. "No need to be hostile, dude. They brought us some food so I decided to wake you up before these savages ate all of it."

"We're not savages. We're hungry," said a girl sitting next to them defensively, then went back to devouring a piece of bread in a rather savage-like manner.

Thomas stood up with a yawn and scanned the room for food. He saw a large box in the middle of the room that hadn't been there before. As he made his way over to it he felt the muscles in his legs ache from overexertion.

Once he'd gotten closer to the box he saw that it contained half a dozen bread rolls. They had a distinct greyish color and would not have looked very appealing if he hadn't been starving.

Though as he was starving, he wasted no time scooping up a piece of bread and sinking his teeth into it.

Once he'd finished his meal he felt full, despite the small size of the roll. He would've felt great, except the dry bread had worsened his thirst, and they had not been provided with water.

He sighed as he brushed breadcrumbs off his clothes. They would be given water sooner or later, he would just have to wait.

He wandered through the room aimlessly for a while, occasionally stopping to converse with one of his friends, though they didn't really have anything to talk about.

Predictably, the door opened before long. Brenda stepped into the room and cleared her throat to get everyone's attention; which was unnecessary as she already had all eyes on her.

"Everyone who needs to go to the bathroom: pair up in groups of three. I'll take one group at a time, and don't even think about trying to escape. Trust me, you wouldn't succeed anyway. Any questions?" She spoke fast, though clearly. She looked around at them, though she seemed to skip over Thomas.

Aris raised his hand, a stony expression on his face. Thomas worried that he would accuse Brenda of betraying them or something like that. He'd mentioned to most of the people in group A that she appeared to be suffering some form of amnesia (though he still didn't know whether or not that was true), as they knew her from when they walked through the scorch together and might feel betrayed. (The girls in the other group had seen Brenda but hadn't interacted with her as much as the boys.) But he hadn't told Aris, who had been with group A when they met Brenda.

To Thomas' relief, Aris only informed Brenda that they needed water, to which she replied that they could drink from the bathroom sinks.

After that nobody had anything to say, so they all divided into groups of three. Thomas and Minho (the latter of whom had come to stand beside Thomas when Brenda came in) made to stand with Newt, though the blond boy was apparently still mad at Minho as he made a point of walking in the opposite direction.

After a minute of scuffling the teenagers were all standing in trios with varying degrees of orderliness.

Brenda gave a satisfied nod before gesturing for the group closest to her to follow.

They returned after a few minutes and it was the next group's turn, then the next's, and so on. The door opened and slammed shut. Once, twice… Five times, then it was his turn to exit the dungeon-like room accompanied by Minho, Aris, and of course, Brenda.

The bathroom looked like your average public bathroom, with a few foul-smelling stalls and a row of sinks at the opposite side of the room. Thomas had to try hard not to rush over to the nearest sink and begin shoveling water into his mouth. As it was, he went to use the bathroom, then he washed his hands. He hadn't realized just how dirty his hands had been until he put them under the running water and layers of dirt and grime were washed off, leaving his palms a significantly lighter shade. He located a soap-dispenser and used a liberal amount of the perfumed foam to get rid of any residual grime and bacteria getting sick was the last thing he needed at the moment.

When he was finally done he turned down the temperature of the water until it became icy cold. He put his hands together under the tap and raised them to his mouth. He relished in the feeling of the cool liquid in his dry mouth. He kept drinking until he was sure he would explode if he continued. He felt much better than before. His head felt clear and the fatigue was completely gone.

Once the other two were finished Brenda led them back to their cell without a word.

The next half hour (or something like that) was uneventful, but just as Thomas sighed out of boredom for the seventh time, the door shot open. There stood Vince, arms crossed and glowering at nothing in particular.

"Time to go. That is, time for Thomas, Isaac..." he trailed off as he looked around the room thoughtfully, his finger pointing from one person to the other as if that would help him decide. "You," he indicated Teresa, "and... you." This time he pointed at a cluster of girls, who all looked confused. "No, not you, the girl with the short hair," he said impatiently as one of the girls stepped forward. Thomas realized that he meant Harriet. The leader of group B looked stricken but said nothing. Thomas guessed it was because she didn't want to leave Sonya, though she was smart enough to know that any protests would do nothing except give Vince leverage.

"But you said-" Thomas began.

"you and four others, yes. you're taking the injured girl with you."

"You can't!" Harriet practically yelled, looking positively murderous. Then she realized her mistake and forced a neutral expression. "What I mean is, it wouldn't be smart to do that, she has a concussion in the best case, she won't be able to travel through the forest or fight cranks. She could die, or at least slow us down," she said in a more reasonable voice.

"'It wouldn't be smart'," Vince repeated, "and you, of course, know better than me. Is that what you're saying?

"No," said Harriet in an unconvincing tone.

"Well, what are you all waiting for?" Vince demanded suddenly, "time to go!"

Thomas hastily said his goodbyes to Minho, then he grabbed Newt (who had been staring into the distance and not made any move towards the exit) by the elbow and walked out of the room. He turned to look at the people remaining in the room, wondering if he would ever see them again.

A sharp intake of breath caught Thomas' attention, he turned to his left and saw Harriet, who was looking incredulously at a group of people he assumed were the ones escorting them to WICKED's base. He didn't recognize anyone except for Brenda. But they weren't what had warranted Harriet's reaction. Sonya was with them. Like before, she was unconscious. A tall, burly man had slung her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Harriet hurried forward and put her hand against her friend's throat, feeling for a pulse. She must have felt one because she relaxed somewhat. She turned to Brenda and started firing questions at her.

Brenda looked at the distressed girl with sympathy as she explained that Sonya was 'just fine', and they were 'only delaying her awakening', though she wouldn't elaborate on the latter.

Maybe it was supposed to serve as a distraction, or maybe it was to make the people over at WICKED let them in faster. Something seemed off, though he had no idea what it was.

"Look, I get that you're worried about your friend, but we need to get going," said Brenda, now looking more annoyed than sympathetic.

Harriet gave her a resentful look before saying: "fine, but she better be okay. And by the way, if we're leaving now, shouldn't we bring supplies?"

Thomas felt a bit embarrassed about not noticing before then that no one appeared to be carrying any supplies. Apparently, Harriet was more observant than him even while she was upset.

"The supplies are waiting for us in a location not far from here, along with three of our colleagues," Brenda explained as she began walking down the corridor. The rest of the group followed, including Thomas.

 _Another thing I didn't notice. Vince said there'd be ten of them and there are only seven of them here._

"What exactly is this 'location'?" Thomas asked while he waited for Brenda to open the door at the end of the corridor.

"Train station in an abandoned village, we'll take a train to our second base and continue from there."

A second base? It wasn't all that surprising, but he couldn't help but wonder what kind of state the place would be in. The base they were currently in spoke of a lack of resources, and that seemed to be the main base.

The party moved through the corridors, a few of them shining flashlights into the darkness to illuminate their path. Despite that, the corridors were still dark and creepy. Thomas held onto Newt's arm tighter. His friend either didn't notice or didn't mind that Thomas hadn't let go of him. Or maybe, like Thomas, he needed all the comfort he could get.

Thomas felt a bit disappointed when they reached the ladder and he had to let go.

He put his hands on the ladder and began climbing, the rusted metal colder than ever under his fingers.


	25. Train

_Authors note: I'm sorry for taking so long to update again. I'll try to post chapters more frequently, though I can't make any promises. What I can promise is that I'm not going to abandon the story, so at least you won't have to worry about that. Now, enjoy chapter 25!_

Chapter 25.

Thomas had expected to be met by more darkness as he exited the claustrophobic tunnel, but to his surprise, he was blinded by sunlight when the trap door opened. There were several people above him blocking most of the light, but even that level of brightness was too much after spending time in the poorly lit underground.

He blinked a few times, which thankfully made his eyes sting a little less.

He looked down as he continued climbing upward and the light intensified.

He reached the end of the ladder and heaved himself out of the tunnel. To his surprise, the metal surrounding the trap door was white with frost.

He stood up hastily to take in his surroundings.

After his eyes had gotten used to the light, he saw that the door wasn't the only thing covered in frost. The grass glittered as if sprinkled with powdered diamonds. The bushes and trees weren't completely covered in it, but there was the occasional patch of glittering coldness.

The forest was thick, but the sun made its way through the trees in several places. It was around mid-day, by the looks of it, but the frost seemingly hadn't melted all that much. The long climb had made Thomas warm and sweaty, but he could already feel the icy cold pressing in on him from all directions.

The sudden drop in temperature made Thomas disoriented. It had been cold before, but not _this_ cold. How long had they been down in that cell exactly? Surely it hadn't been more than a day. Thomas had thought it would be even less. Of course, he _had_ just been disproven, but he doubted his senses were _that_ off.

He pulled at his mournfully short shirtsleeves in an effort to cover his hands from the chilly air while he waited for the rest of the group to reach the surface. It was taking longer than it should, probably because of the unconscious Sonya.

He looked around at his companions. Newt stood idly beside him. Teresa had struck up a conversation with Brenda, though Thomas couldn't hear what was being said due to a commotion over at the opened trap door. Two of the strangers were trying to help one of their colleagues hoist Sonya out of the tunnel, while Harriet was reminding them (very loudly) to be careful with her friend.

Once that ordeal was over it took less than a minute for the rest of them to make it out.

The door was closed and covered once again with branches. (The branches must've been put back in place after they had entered the previous day, because they were much closer to the trap door than before, having only been slightly displaced when the door was opened a few minutes prior.)

After that, they finally started walking.

The forest turned sparser the farther they went. Thomas could see a thin layer of half-melted snow in several places.

The sun had moved quickly through the sky. They couldn't have been walking for more than two hours, but the sun was already starting to set.

The brisk pace they were holding kept most of his body from getting cold, but it did nothing for his fingers, which were stinging, despite his best attempts to bury them in his sleeves. He didn't look forward to another drop in temperature.

Therefore he was relieved when he spotted houses in the horizon. As they got closer he could see that the buildings stood arranged in neat little rows that kept on going for as far as he could see. There were a few stores and playgrounds sprinkled here and there between the neighborhoods.

It would have looked like a safe and peaceful little village if it hadn't been thoroughly destroyed.

The houses were in various states of ruin, there were cars with smashed windshields parked in the middle of the road; in a small park, a rusted swing swayed gently in the breeze, reminding Thomas of creepy ghost towns he could faintly recall having seen in movies.

He was glad they weren't staying there overnight.

Thomas looked around in search of the train station Brenda had said they were headed to, but it must have been hidden somewhere behind the wreckage because it was nowhere in sight.

He was surprised when Brenda lead the way into a fairly small (though mostly whole) building made of dark stone. The structure was way too small to fit even one train, and there were no train-tracks in sight.

It made more sense once he passed the steel doors. There was only one room, decorated with a few benches and tables, along with a big, black screen fixed on the wall. But in the middle of the room, there were two sets of escalators (which were obviously not moving), leading down to… Thomas stepped closer to get a better look. A subway train? Well, it did make a lot of sense, come to think of it. Underground travel was more discrete, for one. And seeing as the solar flares had wreaked havoc on many overground structures, underground train tracks were more likely to be whole. There was, of course, some possibility that the tunnel had caved in, and there was the whole issue of getting the train to actually move, but Thomas assumed the trip had been made before and could be made again.

A door was opened and they all filed onto the train. Thomas had a feeling of deja vu as he looked around. He supposed he had taken the subway sometime before the memory wipe.

The interior of the train looked normal. Not just in the sense that it looked like your typical train (with plastic benches, and metal poles to hold on to); it looked so… unaffected. It wasn't a lab or an underground lair. It was whole and relatively clean, unlike most of their surroundings. It bore no marks of the solar flares or _the_ Flare. It was nice.

The group formed a loose semicircle around Brenda, awaiting further instructions.

Brenda cleared her throat, looking a bit uncomfortable.

Right, so we're taking this train to our second base, which is located close to the WICKED-facility. This train, while not as fast as it used to be, could take us there in a matter of minutes if moving at full speed. However, WICKED has sensors that can detect large objects approaching at a rapid pace. It should take around twenty hours to get there if we move at an undetectable pace."

"What about our supplies?" Thomas asked.

"We have your things, along with some other supplies, stored in here," Brenda said, "now I suggest you make yourselves at home."

"You mean we're allowed to roam the train freely?" Teresa asked. Brenda nodded.

"I'll be in the next compartment if you need me," she said. True to her word, she walked past them and disappeared behind a door on the left.

The others from The Right Arm made no moves to leave the compartment they were in. The three Gladers left for the room on their right, leaving Harriet and Sonya behind after reassurances from Harriet that she didn't mind them leaving.

The next compartment was identical to the last, with a door leading farther right.

Teresa plopped down on a bench with a satisfied sigh.

"Well, this bench isn't exactly comfortable, but my god is it nice to finally sit down," she said.

Thomas sat down next to her. He agreed with Teresa, the bench was cold and hard, but after the long walk, he was happy with any kind of seat.

"Where are you going, Newt?" He heard Teresa ask. He looked at Newt and saw that he was walking towards the door leading farther away from where they'd entered. Newt paused and looked over at them. Thomas noticed that he looked a bit sad, though he had no idea why.

"I figured the two of ya would want some time alone," he said.

"Not really," Teresa said with a slight frown, "I think it'd be more fun if you were here too. The more the merrier, you know?"

Newt shrugged. "I have a bit of a headache, I'd prefer to be alone for a while."

With that, he left the compartment. Thomas wanted to follow his friend, but he'd said he wanted to be alone, so he remained in his seat, listening to the sound of footsteps growing fainter and fainter until they disappeared.

After a few minutes, the train started moving. Thomas could hear the hum of machinery and the sound of the train moving across the tracks. After the train had started moving in a regular pace, the sounds were the only thing indicating they were moving at all. They were moving slowly, and the path must've been very smooth because it felt like they were standing still.

"So, twenty hours, huh," Thomas said, breaking the awkward silence.

"Guess so," Teresa said.

"What do we do now?" Thomas asked

"Maybe talk about something?" Teresa suggested.

"Like what?"

"Like… the future, do you ever think about it?"

Thomas pondered before answering.

"Sometimes, though it's kind of hard to imagine there being a time after this whole mess."

"I get what you mean. Right now we're all focused on getting the cure, but what do we do after that? Do we stay with WICKED?"

"Nah, I fully intend to get as far away from them as possible once I have what I want. I'm not sure where I'll go, but I'll find somewhere."

"You're gonna go alone?"

"No, I'll bring anyone who wants to come with me. Newt, Minho, maybe the other Gladers…" Thomas trailed off.

"Would you want me to come with you?" Teresa asked.

"Of course I would! You're one of my best friends," Thomas said, "I take it you want to come with me, then?"

This earned him a shrug. "I don't know. I mean, I don't like WICKED, but what I like even less is leaving innocent people to suffer when I know I could save them. I know I can help if only to distribute the cure to the infected."

"So you want to start working for WICKED?"

"If that's what I'll have to do, then yes," Teresa said, before adding, "stop looking at me like I'm crazy, will you? WICKED might not be good, but they're not pure evil. Most of them just want to help people, just like me, and I'm not evil, am I?"

Thomas sighed. "No, you're definitely not evil, and maybe not everyone at WICKED is either, but still, they went too far. We were innocent kids. They took us from our families, separated siblings, killed so many of our friends. How is that right?"

"It's wasn't right, but it was necessary. Even if we hadn't been taken, we still would have suffered. More of us would be dead by now, myself included. If the Flare isn't stopped, humanity is done for. At least now we have the hope of finding a cure, even if the cost is high. It's sacrificing a few to save many."

"Would you sacrifice your own life for it?" Thomas asked, looking at Teresa, who was looking resolute.

"Yes."

Thomas couldn't help but admire her unselfishness. He wished he could be as good as her, but he knew he wasn't. If he had to choose between saving himself and his friends or the world, he would probably choose the former.

"So you'd be okay with me working for WICKED?" Teresa asked.

"I trust you to do what you think is right," Thomas said with a small smile, "we may not have the same priorities, but that's just because you're not as selfish as I am. I just want to get the cure for Newt, you want to cure the whole world."

Teresa beamed. They both knew that she didn't need his approval (or anyone's, really), but she was happy to have it anyway.

"You really care about him, don't you?" She asked suddenly.

"What?"

"Newt," she clarified.

"Well, yeah. Of course I do, he's one of my best friends," Thomas said, surprised at the change in conversation.

" _really_?"

"Yeah, what's weird about that?"

"I just thought there was something more going on between the two of you," Teresa said casually.

Thomas stuttered incoherently. He knew perfectly well that he could be somewhat oblivious at times, but there was no mistaking it.

"You think I _like_ Newt?"

Teresa didn't respond, giving Thomas more time to process. And then something dawned on him.

"You're not the only one who thinks that! Minho told me earlier not to hurt his feelings, then there was this guard who said something. She didn't mention any names, but now I'm pretty sure she was talking about Newt…" Thomas said, thinking out loud, "who else thinks that? Does _he_ think that?"

"Calm down, Tom," Teresa said, trying to stifle a grin, "the only thing you should be asking right now is whether you actually like him."

"I-I don't know," Thomas said, trying to force his raging mind to slow down.

He liked Newt, but did he _like_ him, like he had Teresa and Brenda? The thought hadn't really struck him before, which didn't work in the favor of that idea. But the more he thought about it, the less impossible it seemed.

Feelings were confusing, difficult to understand, even more difficult to sort into categories. He recognized his previous feelings for Teresa and Brenda as romantic, but what he'd felt for Teresa wasn't the exact same as what he'd felt for Brenda, even though he'd liked both of them romantically.

His current feelings for Newt were different from his feelings for anyone else. When putting some thought into it, Thomas could see that the feelings were something more than just platonic, but did that make them romantic?

He comprised a mental list of what he liked about Newt:

He liked how he always called him Tommy (and the nickname sounded wrong when spoken by anyone else). His mere presence reassured him, and when he smiled at him he felt as if everything was going to be okay. He was smart and witty, and he always knew what to say to make Thomas feel better.

"Teresa?" Thomas said eventually.

"Yeah?"

"Why do _you_ think I like Newt?"

Teresa tilted her head as she pondered the question. "It's the way you look at him, and the way your voice softens when you speak to or about him."

Thomas hadn't been aware that he did any of those things. He wondered what else he hadn't noticed.

"Have you made up your mind yet?" Teresa asked after what she apparently considered long enough.

"I'm not sure. I need more time. But hypothetically, let's say I do like him. does he like me back?"

"Pretty sure," Teresa said, "he's always had a soft spot for you. And he gave you a cutesy nickname."

"'Tommy' isn't cutesy, it's just a normal nickname!"

"That he uses all the time," Teresa said in an undertone.

"You have a nickname for me, and you don't like me."

"anymore."

Thomas sighed.

"I was just joking, Tom. A nickname doesn't prove anything. If you really want to know you should just ask him."

"I can't do that. Not now, at least. I need to be certain."

"Yeah, you should probably wait until you've made up your mind. Now I think you should go hang out with him, It might make deciding easier."

"He said he had a headache and wanted to be alone," Thomas reminded her.

"Oh, right. Maybe wait another hour or so, then you can go check on him."

"That's what I'll do, then," Thomas decided.

He almost did as Teresa had suggested, though he waited closer to a half hour.

After a few minutes of companionable silence, one of the men from The Right Arm entered the compartment. He handed them three blankets and a paper bag containing three sandwiches. One of each for the three Gladers.

Thomas and Teresa ate their share of the food, and then Thomas got up to go find Newt.

"Are you okay with sitting here alone?" Thomas asked, pausing in front of the door.

"Actually I'm going to go see Brenda. She seems like a decent enough person, and having her on our side could prove useful."

"Right. That's a good idea," Thomas said, feeling very stupid. He was the one who had made plans to sway Brenda to their side so she could help them, but he had barely thought about her after that. He was glad Teresa'd had the same idea, though he decided he would also go talk to Brenda, some other time.

When he entered the next compartment he expected to find Newt there, but the room was empty. He continued to the next, to the same discovery. After passing two more empty compartments, he entered the last one, judging by the lack of a door at the far end. The light had been turned off, leaving the room in a green-tinted semi-darkness, due to a glowing green emergency exit sign.

There was a large, unmoving shape on the floor.

"Newt!" Thomas cried in alarm, dropping what he was holding and rushing towards him.

When he got closer he saw that he lay curled up, with his hands buried in his hair as if he'd been clutching his head.

Thomas knelt down beside him and shook his arm urgently, while simultaneously trying to feel for a pulse.

To his immense relief, Newt stirred. A hand landed on Thomas', trying feebly to push it away. Thomas stopped shaking his friend immediately.

"Newt," Thomas said sharply when it looked like he was going to go on sleeping.

Newt opened his eyes slowly.

"Tommy? What…?" he said sleepily, sitting up.

"What happened? Are you okay?" Thomas asked.

"I dunno, my head hurt and then… I don't know."

"You blacked out?"

"Guess I did."

"How do you feel now?"

"Better than before."

"So I can turn the lights back on, then?" Thomas pointed at the light switch.

"Sure."

When Thomas turned the lights back on, Newt made a grimace and squeezed his eyes shut, probably because he'd been in the dark for so long. Then Thomas looked away from his face and saw something he hadn't seen before.

"You have blood on your hands!" He exclaimed, making his way back to his friend hurriedly.

Newt lifted his hands in front of his face, studying his fingers.

Thomas snatched one of his hands to get a better look. The nails were caked with dried blood. The fingertips were covered with the stuff, and there were reddish brown stains covering most of his fingers and palm.

He didn't have to look far for the source. There was blood in Newt's hair.

"Were you clawing at your head?" Thomas asked as he parted the hair to inspect the wounds.

"I might have been, I don't know."

"Well, it looks like the bleeding has stopped, at least. I saw a bathroom right outside this compartment, we should go there and clean the wounds," Thomas said.

Newt got up from his sitting position, but he was shaky and nearly lost his balance.

"Change of plans. You stay here, and I'll be back soon," Thomas said, helping Newt towards one of the benches.

Newt sat down without complaint and Thomas walked to the bathroom between their compartment and the one next to it. He came back a minute later with a handful of damp paper towels.

He started wiping away the blood until all that remained were the angry red lines.

"I don't think I have enough time," Newt said calmly.

Thomas stilled for a moment, before resuming the cleaning.

"What makes you say that?" Thomas asked.

"A few days ago I felt mostly normal, but now I feel close to losing it completely. It shouldn't be happening this fast."

"Maybe it's a trick," Thomas suggested, "WICKED trying to mess with you again, making you think it's worse than it actually is." It sounded like a lame excuse. While WICKED was likely messing with them in some manner, Thomas doubted that was all there was to it.

"If anything, they're probably tryin' to speed up the process" Newt grumbled.

Thomas didn't have anything good to say to that. It actually sounded plausible, though he didn't want to admit it, and he couldn't come up with a good counterargument.

"Tommy, I don't want to worry you, but I need to warn you. I'm dangerous to be around. I could lose control. I could hurt you. I could kill you. If that happens, you have to defend yourself. You can't hesitate, because I won't"

"Newt, I'm not going to kill you."

"I don't want you to have to do that, but if it comes to it, you have to save yourself. You don't have to kill me, you could just try to knock me out or something, but you can't hesitate to act."

"Fine," Thomas said, though the thought of hurting Newt in any way seemed unthinkable.

Newt nodded in approval as he wiped the blood off his hands with a paper towel.

"Just keep in mind that you promised not to give up," Thomas said.

"I'm not saying that I've given up. I just think it's better to be ready if something goes wrong."

"What we should be focusing on right now is making sure it doesn't come to that," Thomas said, "don't overthink stuff. Try to rest as much as possible. We know that mental activity speeds up the process."

"I'm trying," Newt said, "but it's so bloody difficult. I hate being the weak link. I hate standing back and doing nothin'"

"I know, but you're not weak, you're fighting the Flare, even though you do it by not doing anything. I have a plan for what to do, you don't have to worry about it. It'll be over soon."

"I sure hope so," Newt said.


	26. Camera

Chapter 26.

As the hours passed, the temperature seemed to drop.

Thomas sat on one of the long benches in the train-compartment with a blanket wrapped around him.

Newt lay on the same bench, his head only a few centimeters away from Thomas. He was snoring softly in his sleep; a noise which would annoy most people, but to Thomas, it had a sort of calming effect.

He kept thinking about what he and Teresa had talked about earlier: him having a crush on Newt.

If it was true, then shouldn't he have realized it for himself? And shouldn't the idea have made immediate sense to him?

But there was something that kept him from dismissing the idea. There was a feeling. A kind of gut instinct telling him the whole thing hadn't been a misunderstanding. Didn't that prove it to be true? Logically speaking it seemed a bit far-fetched, but wasn't love more about feelings than logistics?

He wasn't sure how much weight should be placed on feelings at a time like this, though. The Flare made being around Newt an emotional roller coaster, which just added to the confusion. He certainly cared for Newt, and he always worried about him, but he was unsure if that was because he had already lost him once or if he had feelings for him that were more than platonic.

He looked at Newt, asleep and blissfully unaware of Thomas' predicament. Newt looked very different when he was sleeping. It was almost eerie. Thomas couldn't help but feel worried. Newt had said it himself that he was getting worse faster than he should, and it seemed to grow worse by the hour.

It didn't make sense. WICKED had even given him medication to slow the virus down, but the opposite thing was happening. Then it clicked. WICKED wasn't trying to slow the virus, they were trying to speed up the process.

Thomas felt stupid for not realizing it earlier. At the same time, he felt a wave of betrayal wash over him, and he felt even more stupid for putting the slightest trust in WICKED. Didn't he know better than that? They were always making them suffer, so why should this come as a surprise to him? What if they were going to make him watch Newt die all over again? He hated WICKED so much at that moment it made him feel like crying, yelling, and breaking something, all at the same time. The worst was that he couldn't do anything about it. WICKED were the only ones that had a chance of finding a cure in time, and anything Thomas did to oppose them would only result in wasting precious time. WICKED probably knew that, too. They had made sure that their test subjects would stay in line and do as they were told. The only thing Thomas could do was make sure everything went according to plan and hope for the best, though the former was a massive failure already.

The only thing keeping Thomas from falling into a pit of pure despair was Newt. Seeing him so peaceful made Thomas feel peaceful himself, even though it made him slightly worried at the same time.

He leaned over to brush away a strand of hair that had fallen in his friend's face, but unfortunately, that was all it took to wake him up. He sat up suddenly, headbutting Thomas as he did. Thomas practically leapt backward in surprise and pain, and Newt scrambled away from him, very confused and somewhat panicked. When he didn't see any apparent danger he relaxed.

"What…?" He asked, not bothering to finish the sentence.

"You woke up and accidentally headbutted me," Thomas informed him, "I'm assuming it was accidental, anyway."

"Oh, right. Sorry," Newt said, still looking confused.

Thomas was too embarrassed to tell Newt the reason he'd woken up was that he had brushed the hair out of his face for no reason in particular. Why had he even done that in the first place?

He hoped Newt was too tired to question why Thomas had been close enough to get headbutted in the first place.

"Did you sleep well?" Thomas asked, trying to shift the focus away from what had just happened.

Newt nodded absently but didn't say anything.

The next few minutes went by slowly. Newt sat completely still, turned away from Thomas. Thomas stared at the back of his friend's head and wondered if he was giving him the silent treatment or if he was simply thinking. For every passing minute, the feeling that he'd done something wrong grew. Soon it was positively unbearable.

"Have you ever liked anyone?" Thomas blurted out, desperate to escape the horrible silence, though he wasn't entirely sure why he'd chosen that question.

Newt turned around and looked at Thomas in surprise. "Of course I have. I like you, and Minho, and Frypan-"

"No, not like that," Thomas interrupted, very impatient all of a sudden, "have you ever liked anyone _romantically_?"

"Oh," Newt said, "well, yes to that, too. Why do you wanna know?"

"I think I might have… um… a crush… on this person, but I'm not sure one way or another," Thomas explained.

"Really? Who's the lucky girl?"

"Not lucky, not a girl, and no offense, but I'd rather not say who it is," Thomas said.

"Okay, so you think you might have a crush on an anonymous, unlucky guy?"

"Something like that."

"Well, I suppose I could try to help you decide if you like that person, but don't expect any advice on how to confess your undying love or whatever. That, I've no idea how to do."

Thomas nodded, urging Newt to go on.

"Right," Newt said, now looking a bit uncomfortable, "I suppose you have a crush when you start thinking about the person all the time, and when you always want to be with them. Its when you feel all warm and fuzzy inside whenever they smile, and when you would do anything to keep him safe." Newt's voice had gone from hesitant, to sure, to dreamy, giving the distinct impression he was talking from personal experience.

Thomas was stunned. Because he thought about Newt all the time. When the two of them were separated, he found himself missing Newt almost immediately. He felt warm on the inside when he saw the other boy smiling, and he would do anything to keep him safe, otherwise, he probably wouldn't be where he was at the moment.

Of course, he knew romance wasn't an exact science. Different people felt different things. Some things could be signs of attraction to one person, and something entirely different to someone else.

But still, there were more things pointing toward him having a crush on Newt than away from it at the moment. He wasn't sure yet, but he decided to just continue with what he was doing and keep the possibility in mind; hopefully, the answer would become apparent over time.

"Do you want to talk about it or somethin'?" He asked, clearly hoping the answer was no.

Thomas shook his head. "Let's talk about something else. Unless you want to go back to sleep, of course."

"Maybe _you_ should get some sleep. Aren't you tired?" Newt asked.

"Not even remotely," Thomas said. It wasn't strictly true, he _was_ a bit tired, but he felt more like talking than sleeping.

"How about you clue me in on your brilliant plan for getting us out of this mess?"

"You think I have a brilliant plan? How touching."

"That was sarcasm."

"Figures," Thomas said in an undertone. Then, in a normal voice, "I do have a plan, though."

He told Newt about the plan to get Brenda on their side and have her trick Vince into bringing their friends to the WICKED-facility, where The Right Arm would be overpowered, removing them from the equation.

Newt nodded along as it was explained to him.

"That sounds like it just might work. As long as we don't rely on it too much, and are adaptable to any changes in the situation."

"Exactly," Thomas agreed, "so what do you think? Is it a brilliant plan?"

"Well, it looks promising, but I'm saving the answer for after the plan is executed."

"Sounds fair," Thomas said with a smile.

Newt looked away to the side, as if flustered. Then he tensed all of a sudden.

"What?" Thomas asked.

Newt pointed at the luggage rack above the bench opposite them. When Thomas didn't see anything out of the ordinary, he moved closer to Newt and finally saw what he saw. There, in the corner of the rack…

"A camera," Newt said.

It was, indeed, a camera. There was no mistaking it. The question was whether there were any listening devices hidden in the compartment. If it was just that one camera, there wasn't really anything to worry about. Due to the way it was placed, only Newt had been seen on it. He'd been turned toward Thomas, making it difficult to read his lips from the footage, and even so, he hadn't said anything incriminating. But if there were listening devices as well… That meant Thomas had just revealed their plan to the enemy.

Thomas crossed the room and tried to reach for the camera, but even as he stood on his tiptoes, the camera was out of his reach by mere millimeters.

Newt, being taller than Thomas, got hold of the camera easily. With a mighty pull, the camera was ripped off the wall, leaving only a few severed wires. Newt gave the camera a quick once-over, before handing it to Thomas.

Thomas studied the camera with more care than his friend. He wasn't an expert on cameras, but there looked to be more wires hanging from it than was necessary for only a video camera. It was very possible that some form of wiretap was attached to it.

To be on the safe side, he threw the device to the floor and brought his foot down on it.

"Do you think there're more of them?" Newt asked, "what if there are wiretaps hidden somewhere?"

"I think there was one on the camera we found, but we should check for others," Thomas said.

They proceeded to go through the room in search of more spying equipment, but they didn't find anything.

"Looks like it was just that one camera. The question is, are we being monitored, or was it just there from before?" Thomas said.

"We should just assume the worst. Rather safe than sorry, right?"

"What should we do, then? Do you think we have a chance of destroying the recording somehow before someone sees it?"

"It depends on whether someone's viewing it immediately or saving it for later," Newt said.

"That leaves a small chance, at least. Of course, we have to find it first. There's probably some kind of control room where all recordings are sent. If it's here on the train, then it's got to be on the other side of the train, probably where Brenda is. Maybe if we come up with a distraction of some sort. Lure her and whoever else might be there away. What should we do for a distraction?"

"I know what we can do," Newt said. Then he brought his hands up to his own head, and clawed at it, opening the recently closed wounds. Thomas stared at him, horrified, thinking he'd lost control of himself. "What are you doing?" He stuttered.

"I'm creating a distraction. Go. tell them I'm having a fit or something."

Thomas nodded and left. As he walked through compartment after compartment, he tried to make himself look distraught. He needed to pretend he was too upset to lead them to Newt. As he passed a bathroom, he got an idea.

He put some soap on his fingertip, then touched it to both of his eyes. It hurt like crazy, but it had the intended effect. The burning pain made his eyes tear up immediately. He glanced at the mirror above the sink and saw (between his rapid blinking) that his eyes were red.

After that, he rushed out of the bathroom, and through another compartment, until he reached the one Harriet, Sonya, and everyone from The Right Arm (except for Brenda) was in. He registered some of them standing up and demanding to know what was wrong, but he ran past them into the next compartment.

Brenda and Teresa were both in there. They'd been sitting and conversing, but both jumped out of their seats when Thomas bolted inside.

"What's wrong?!" Teresa asked, alarmed at the state of him.

"It's… It's my friend," Thomas said, gasping for breath exaggeratedly as if he'd ran all the way from the other side of the train.

"What about him?" Brenda demanded.

"He… I don't know what happened. He just…" Thomas said, trying to sound as scared and pathetic as possible before he buried his head in his hands and started fake-sobbing. He had to admit he was a good actor.

Brenda muttered something unintelligible and rushed out of the room.

Thomas dropped his act as soon as he heard the door slam shut.

Teresa was standing in front of him, an inquiring look on her face.

"What's going on?" She asked.

"We found a camera," Thomas explained, "and possibly a wiretap, too. I need to find the place the recordings are sent to, while they're distracted."

Teresa didn't ask any questions. She grabbed Thomas by the arm and led him to the other side of the compartment, where there was a door leading to another room.

"I asked Brenda about how the train works. She told me the control room is in there, and there doesn't need to be anyone in there while the train is moving, so it's empty," Teresa said quickly. She opened the door and shoved Thomas inside.

"See if you can find the footage, I'll go buy you as much time as I can."

"Thanks," Thomas called after her as she ran toward the other side of the train.

He closed the door to the control room and turned to see what he was dealing with.

There was a large window at the front of the room, though it was hard to see much in the darkness outside of it. There was a seat (empty, thank goodness) facing the window, surrounded by various levers and buttons. That had to be the driver's seat. Thomas dismissed that part of the room, and soon found something much more promising. There was a small, secluded area, which had a number of small screens in a cluster on the wall. The screens were turned off, but their purpose was clear. There was also a small desk with a computer on top of it. The screen was black, but it emitted a low, humming sound, which meant it had either been turned off recently, or it was still on. Thomas pressed the buttons on the side of the screen until he found the right one. The computer screen lit up.

Thomas didn't even have to search for the recordings, the programme containing them was already open.

Thomas couldn't remember having used a computer at any point, but he must've worked with this stuff before the memory wipe because he knew exactly what to do. There were fifteen tiny images, each titled with a number. 1, 1.2, 2, 2.2, 3…

Thomas moved the computer mouse across the desk until the little arrow was on the image titled 8.2. There was no 8, so it was fair to assume that was the camera he'd destroyed, and that 8.2 was in the compartment he and Newt had been in. He tapped it, and the picture grew slightly larger.

He heard the unmistakable sound of voices right next to him.

Thomas was instantly filled with panic, thinking Brenda had returned and discovered him. Then he realized that the sound was coming from the wrong direction for that to be the case.

He turned to look at the screens on the wall, one of which was now turned on. He couldn't hear what the voices were saying, and the camera only showed a corner of the room, so he couldn't see what was going on either, but the important thing was that he knew that there were listening devices (as well as another camera) hidden in that room, and almost definitely all the other rooms, too.

He shifted his focus back to the computer and saw that a number of options had appeared below the picture of 8.2. He chose the arrow pointing to the left, rewinding the video. He marked the recording of the last hour or so and chose the 'delete' option.

He'd done it. He released a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

Then he remembered that he'd had more than one conversation he'd rather keep secret. He'd talked to Teresa about his plans earlier, and then their conversation right before he went into the control room.

He deleted all the footage from fifteen hours back to the present on camera 3, and the footage from ten hours to one hour ago on camera 3.2. He removed a few hours from the footage from the room next to him just as easily.

He figured that would be slightly less suspicious than if he'd only deleted his conversations, but just to be sure, he deleted random amounts of footage from five other cameras.

There. _Now_ he'd done it.

He turned off the computer screen so it was like when he'd entered, then he left the control room. He felt like running out at full speed, cheering; but he knew about the cameras in the compartment.

He walked out as slowly as he could manage, trying not to stare at the cameras he now knew the location of. He kept his head down and wiped at his face with his arm. In case anyone asked him why he'd gone in there, he'd just say he'd been upset and wanted to be alone.

Thomas couldn't believe his luck. Everything had gone smoothly. There wasn't even anyone in the compartment when he entered it.

He figured he should go to the other side of the train, where Newt and Teresa were buying him time. He was a bit worried that someone might get hurt, and he wanted to get there as fast as possible. But he couldn't drop the act now. He walked as fast as he could while still appearing hesitant.

Once he entered the next compartment, only Harriet, Sonya, and three of the people from The Right Arm were there.

"Thomas! What happened?" Harriet asked.

"It's N… Nothing to worry about," he said. He'd forgotten about Newt's fake name for a moment.

"Are you sure? Brenda just stormed past and took six people with her. Then Teresa came running after them."

"I better go there and make sure they're alright, then," Thomas said. He used this as an excuse to make his way to the distraction faster.

When he finally reached the door leading to the last compartment of the train, he hesitated for a moment. Not only for the sake of the cameras but because he wasn't sure what he would see.

After taking a deep breath, he opened the door.

It was absolute chaos.

Newt was fighting tooth and nail against four people, while Teresa was shooting questions rapidly at Brenda and two others, pulling at their sleeves and yelling louder at them whenever they tried to join the fight.

Thomas wasn't sure how exactly Newt had resisted four people for this long. Sure, he was big and strong, and he fought like a wild animal, but his opponents were much older than him, and each of them looked like they could win a fight against him.

Judging by the sheer ferocity he was fighting with, he was under the control of the Flare. It was very possible he'd given up control on purpose. He looked painfully similar to their last meeting in the simulation. Bloody, bruised, and out of control

Nobody had noticed Thomas, standing uselessly in the doorway, until Newt caught a glimpse of him. There was definitely something wild in his eyes. But when he saw Thomas, he stilled. The wilderness disappeared.

It was a mistake.

Thomas cried out, but it was too late.

One of the men raised a gun. He slammed the weapon into the back of Newt's head.

Thomas winced, though he felt relieved that the man hadn't shot his friend.

Newt stumbled forward, losing his balance and collapsing to the floor.

Thomas rushed forward to help him up, but the man that had hit him beat him to it. He yanked Newt up by the arm and slammed him against the wall. He pointed his gun at Newt's temple.

"Let go of him!" Thomas shouted, as that was pretty much the only thing he could do (seriously, that guy was _enormous_ ).

The man ignored him. To Thomas' horror, his finger was starting to press down on the trigger.

"You want me to shoot you right here? Huh? You filthy crank," the man snarled.

"No! Stop!" Thomas yelled, running up to the man and trying to pull his arm away to no success.

"John, that's enough!" Brenda called. For a terrible moment, it looked like he would ignore her, too. Then he backed off, muttering under his breath.

Newt slumped against the wall, rubbing the back of his head and glaring at John.

"Are you okay?" Thomas asked.

"I'm fine. You?"

"I'm great," Thomas said.

Newt smiled. He understood the underlying message. Thomas had succeeded.

The smile dropped when Brenda approached them, with Teresa in tow.

Brenda did not look happy.

"What happened, exactly?" She demanded.

"I lost control. I'm sorry. It won't happen again," Newt said.

"It better not," Brenda said, "if it happens again we might not have a choice."

She didn't sound angry like Thomas had expected her to. She sounded sympathetic.

She suddenly turned on her heel and exited the room without looking back. The other members of The Right Arm following closely behind.

Teresa looked at Thomas enquiringly.

 _"_ _I did it,"_ Thomas said telepathically. Or rather, he tried to. He could tell that it wasn't working at the moment. The only apparent effect was a faint pain in his head. Instead, he settled for a wink, which worked just as well. The three of them sat down on a bench, exhausted after the whole ordeal.

 _Crisis averted,_ Thomas thought as he curled up on the bench and fell asleep.


	27. Collapse

_On this day last year, I posted the very first chapter of this fanfic._

 _Time really moves quickly, doesn't it?_

 _And what better way to celebrate than write another chapter?_

 _Here you go, Chapter 27_ _._

Chapter 27.

Thomas had settled into a kind of routine

Fall asleep. Wake up with a jolt and a lingering sense of dread from some forgotten nightmare. Stare blankly into space. Repeat.

He wasn't sure how many times he went through this process, and he didn't really care.

He was broken out of his dazed state when heavy footsteps could be heard from somewhere nearby, getting louder.

The door was pushed open with too much force. It hit the wall with a loud _Bang_.

Teresa, who had been sleeping, was woken by the loud noise and practically jumped out of her seat, looking strikingly similar to a startled cat. Thomas thought she might've given the man who barged into the room a low hiss, though he probably just imagined that.

Speaking of the man who barged into the room, it was the same unpleasant guy they'd encountered earlier. John, if memory served right.

"We're here," he announced.

"Where's here?" Thomas asked.

"None of your business, brat," the man responded, as he left the room, possibly to avoid further questioning.

Thomas exchanged a glance with Teresa.

"I guess we better get going then," Thomas said.

"Guess so," Teresa agreed.

They got up and left. Thomas and Teresa in the lead, and Newt trailing behind them.

Thomas wondered if there would be another long walk to reach The Right Arm's second base.

As per usual, his thought process was interrupted. This time it was the train making a sudden movement to one side. Just as a disgruntled Thomas picked himself off the floor, the sudden movement was repeated, only to the other side. After falling flat on his back, Thomas crawled to the left, where there were things to hold onto. He got up and kept walking, making sure he had something to hold onto in case it happened again.

The train was still until they reached the compartment everyone else was in. Thomas was prepared this time. He clung to the door tightly and managed to stay upright. Some of the people in the room were not as lucky. There was an assortment of stumbling and swearing.

"That's it!" Brenda said, "Williams, go help those idiots."

A short man who must've been Williams nodded and took off in the direction of the control room.

"What's going on?" Teresa asked.

Brenda turned, looking surprised to see them there, but quickly regained her composure. "We went past the exit, so we had to go back. But apparently the idiots I sent to do it went too far back," she explained.

There was a final lurch, and then the doors leading off the train slid open.

Just enough light came from inside the train to reveal what was on the other side.

There was a brick wall. And right in the middle of the wall, there was a large hole, big enough that a person could crawl through.

 _No,_ Thomas thought, _please don't tell me-_

"We're going through the tunnel," Brenda said, tossing a backpack at Thomas, "take your backpacks with you and be careful. If you scrape the ceiling too much it could cave in."

Thomas was growing less keen on heading into the tunnel by the second.

He checked out the backpack he'd been given. It was one of the bags WICKED had given them. His friends picked up a backpack each from a small pile behind Brenda. The backpack felt empty, though Thomas didn't have any time to check. Brenda had already gone into the tunnel, Teresa following closely after.

Thomas stepped closer with some hesitance. He drew a deep breath and crawled into the tunnel.

It was horrible. It was like he'd been swallowed by the earth. He couldn't see a thing. There was damp dirt everywhere. The mud-like substance was caked on his hands, under his fingernails. The moisture was seeping into his clothes. He could feel small clumps of dirt fall from the ceiling, landing on his exposed neck and making its way under his shirt collar.

What little air existed in the cramped passage was tainted with the smell and taste of the ever-present dirt.

As if crawling on all fours wasn't bad enough, at one point the ceiling had been particularly low, and he'd had to lie flat on his stomach and wriggle his way forwards.

He wondered why anyone had thought it'd be a good idea to dig a tunnel like this. Rather than just dig a hole straight down and put a ladder in it, the idiot had dug a long tunnel leading gradually upward, and an unstable tunnel at that.

Thomas shouldn't have been as surprised as he was when part of the tunnel caved in.

He couldn't pinpoint the exact location, but it was somewhere behind him. There were people screaming.

Brenda let out a string of curse words. "Everyone, hurry up, the whole tunnel could collapse!" She called.

"But Williams and Jordan-" someone began.

"There's nothing we can do for them, we have to go!" Brenda insisted.

The other person continued protesting, but Brenda crawled away at record speed, Teresa and Thomas hot on her heels.

Had only those two people gotten stuck, or were there more? What if Newt had been back there, too? Or Harriet and Sonya? He was too winded to speak, and he was scared the dirt ceiling would collapse on him if he made any sounds. He had no way of knowing if his friends were safe.

After a few more agonizing minutes, Brenda informed them that they were almost at the end of the tunnel. Thomas went even faster in his desperate need to confirm that his friends were still there.

Then it happened. Maybe someone had bumped into the ceiling accidentally, maybe the previous cave-in had triggered some form of chain reaction. There were more sounds of falling dirt, more screaming. And it didn't stop this time, it kept falling.

Thomas could see the end of the tunnel.

They had to move faster. They were so close.

He worried even more as he recalled that his friends couldn't move as fast as he could.

Newt had a limp, which must make crawling agonizing.

Sonya was unconscious and probably had to be dragged by someone, which would definitely slow them down.

They were so close.

Brenda was out of the tunnel. Then Teresa was out. Thomas clawed at the frosty grass and jumped to the side to allow the people behind him to come out.

Someone from the right arm emerged. Then another one. That jerk, John, was the third one. A fourth person came out. He had a rope around his waist, and the other side of it was attached to Sonya, whom he dragged out of the tunnel.

Thomas was getting increasingly worried.

Harriet emerged.

There was a terrible pause. Nobody else came out of the tunnel.

Thomas stared on in shock as nothing happened, tears forming in his eyes.

Then he saw him, saw the blond head sprayed with mud. He rushed forward to help his friend out of the tunnel as it collapsed behind him.

Once Newt was on his feet, Thomas pulled him into a tight hug. Newt was entirely covered in mud, but it wasn't like Thomas was much better.

"I thought I'd lost you," Thomas said as he let go and stepped back, a bit embarrassed.

"After everything that's happened, I won't be beaten by some bloody dirt," Newt said, "though it sure was a close call."

There was a scream from right next to them.

The smiles were wiped off their faces when they saw the source.

A woman had sunk to the ground in front of the collapsed tunnel, pounding her fists against the dirt and sobbing hysterically. She let out another scream, a roar of pure misery.

Thomas wanted to look away, he didn't want to see her anymore. It was too painful to see someone like this. But his gaze remained on her, transfixed.

A few of her colleagues tried to comfort her, but she was inconsolable.

After a while, Brenda approached and told her gently that they had to go. She shook her head vigorously, saying something like 'go without me' in a shaking voice.

Brenda looked like she wanted to argue, but decided against it.

"Everyone, we have to go. It's only a few minutes away."

So nine people went on their way, and one stayed behind to mourn the deaths of five others.

Brenda walked next to Thomas and Newt, letting someone else lead the way through a grassy field, and then through the ruins of a village.

"Poor Jenny," Brenda said, as if thinking out loud, "her husband was the only family she had left, and now he's gone, too.

"Do you think she'll be okay?" Thomas asked.

"No," Brenda said sadly, "she's already lost so much. Of course, all of us have, but not everyone can handle it."

Thomas' heart ached for the poor woman. He'd thought everyone in The Right Arm was a hardened warrior, but maybe there was more to it.

The village they'd entered was just as wrecked as the last one they'd gone through, though it was slightly smaller. There weren't any buildings similar to the subway station they had gone through before, which explained why they'd had to go through a tunnel.

They headed towards what might've once been a school. They walked past the school-building and the creepy, abandoned playground, in the direction of what was probably the sports hall. The building wasn't as broken as the surrounding buildings, though it looked like it was mostly because of reparations.

They entered the building, and the first thing Thomas saw was a kind of common room, where a dozen or so people were having out. Some were talking, one person was reading a book, and another sat drumming his fingers against a table in front of him. There was a large wooden screen that almost reached across the whole room, leaving enough space to walk to the other side of the screen. There were three doors on the wall closest to them. If it was indeed a sports hall, two were probably changing rooms. The third could be an office.

The people in the room all looked at them, scanning their faces in search for their friends. A few of the newcomers ran to them and embraced them. Others were trying to look behind the people standing in the exit, thinking that surely the others would come at any second.

Brenda herded Thomas and his friends towards one of the doors. There are showers in there, go wash off."

Teresa and Harriet went inside, joining forces to half-carry, half-drag Sonya with them.

Thomas and Newt situated themselves outside the door, waiting for their turn.

"Actually, Thomas, can I have a word with you?" Brenda asked.

"Sure, what about?" Thomas asked in surprise.

"How about we go somewhere private?" She suggested, though it was more of an order.

"Right," Thomas said. He looked at Newt, who was frowning. Thomas gave him a smile of reassurance before following Brenda.

She led him to the middle door, which was, indeed, an office.

There were a few chairs around a small table, but neither of them sat down (the muddy footsteps would already take long enough to clean, there was no point in adding two chairs to the list).

"You wanted to talk to me?" Thomas prompted.

"I did, yes," Brenda said, studying Thomas' face thoughtfully, "tell me, have we met before?"

The question took Thomas by surprise. He didn't see how lying to her would work in his favor, so he decided to tell her the truth.

"Yeah, we have. It was in The Scorch. You helped my friends and I. You and a man called Jorge."

Brenda's eyes widened.

"You know about him?"

"Yes, as I said, the two of you helped us. We wouldn't have gotten through The Scorch without you. Don't you remember?"

"No. That's the problem, I don't."

"What do you remember, then?"

Brenda looked like she regretted asking to talk to him.

"You can trust me. We're friends, you just don't remember it." Thomas said.

"Oh really, I'm supposed to tell you the truth, but there's no problem with you lying to me?"

"What do you mean? I haven't-"

"Save it. I know you messed with the monitors. You didn't think there weren't any backups, did you?"

This was bad. _Very_ bad. Thomas didn't say anything. He waited to see what Brenda would do. She could kill Newt, like Vince had threatened, but then why the private talk? She wanted something, that made the most sense. She'd apparently lost her memories, maybe she wanted to know the truth about herself.

"I heard all of it," she continued, " your little plan to use emotional manipulation to get me to help you."

Thomas winced. "It's not like that. I didn't mean it that way."

"What way _did_ you mean it, then?"

"We were going to help you remember. Then we could escape together."

"Oh, sure you were trying to help me. And why would I want to escape anyway?"

"Don't you understand that this is crazy? The Right Arm will destroy WICKED, and then they'll make their own attempt at finding the cure. There's no time to start from scratch."

"You're just saying that because you're scared they'll take too long, and your friend will become more of a Crank than he already is. What if I tell you that we can get it done faster? WICKED hasn't accomplished anything after years of trying. The Right Arm has a plan. They just need the equipment to create the cure, then they'll do it."

"Do it how, exactly?"

"I don't know the details, but-"

"But that means they're going to round up immunes and do who knows what to them. That includes you."

"You don't know that. And besides, haven't you lot been tortured by WICKED already? How do you know _they're_ telling the truth?"

Thomas tried to protest, but he didn't have a good argument for that.

"Look, that's not what I wanted to talk to you about," Brenda said, "I'm the one with the gun, I decide what's right or not. Case closed."

Thomas didn't protest. Brenda could order for him and his friends to be killed any second. As far as leverage went, he didn't have any.

"What _do_ you want to talk about, then?" Thomas asked in defeat.

"I know that part of my memory was wiped. I remember my childhood, and that I started working for WICKED, but after that, I don't remember what happened up until a few weeks ago. I just woke up and I was at WICKED's HQ. They told me I'd been working for them for the past few years, but I'd been in some form of accident, which was why I'd lost some memories -Not that I believe them. They told me about you, and your trial. Then they sent me, Jorge and a few others on a mission to clear a certain area of the Woods of Cranks. We were attacked by The Right Arm. Jorge and I surrendered. The others were killed."

"And you're siding with the people who attacked you and murdered your colleagues?"

"You don't get it. They saved us. They let us join them. They told us they knew how to create a cure for The Flare, and that we could help. So I told them what I knew, and they let me lead this mission."

"What about Jorge?" Thomas asked, "why isn't he here with you?"

That seemed to strike a nerve.

"He was... hesitant to give them information. He's staying at the main base."

"Are you sure about that?" Thomas asked.

"What? Yes. why wouldn't I be?"

"The Right Arm doesn't strike me as lenient to those who don't agree with them. That probably means they're holding him hostage, in case you go against them."

"No. That's not..." Brenda trailed off, looking stricken, before collecting herself again, "that's not what I brought you here to discuss. Have some patience, will you?"

Thomas gave her a noncommittal grunt as a response.

"From what I gather, you have some experience with amnesia. Is there a way for me to regain my memories?"

So that was what she wanted. It was a reasonable demand, though oddly enough, Thomas hadn't been expecting it.

"Sorry, I'm not sure myself," Thomas said, and he felt genuinely sorry for his former friend, "I've just settled on hoping my memories will return if given enough time."

Brenda nodded, clearly disappointed.

"Hang on," Thomas said, "now that you mention it, if WICKED removed your memories, then they have a way to give them back. They have this machine-thing. A few of my friends used it, and they regained their memories."

This wasn't strictly the truth. He had only seen that machine in the simulation. But then again, some of his friends _had_ gotten their memories back, albeit not all of them. But Brenda didn't need to know that.

"You know, if you're trying to trick me into helping you, it won't work," Brenda said.

Thomas felt frustrated. Sure, he wasn't giving her _all_ of the information, but he wasn't lying to her (though he couldn't really blame her for being suspicious).

"If you don't have anything more to say about it, you can leave," Brenda said.

"Okay, but please think about what I said about The Right Arm."

"Fine, but you should take a moment to think about them too before you decide that they're all evil." Brenda proceeded to herd him out of the office and closing the door in his face before he had a chance to start another argument. Thomas decided enough was enough and walked back to his friends.


	28. Ally

Chapter 28.

Newt was no longer standing outside the showers. Thomas hesitated for a moment. He looked around but saw neither Newt nor the girls. He knocked on the door to no response.

He opened the door slowly, and when he was not met with any protests he looked inside.

Newt sat on a bench, dressed in fresh clothes and drying his hair with a towel.

"There you are, Tommy. Took you long enough," he said, his words tinged with a distinct grumpiness.

"What's up with you?" Thomas asked. Newt gave him the unsurprising answer of "nothing".

Thomas didn't feel like prying at the moment. He grabbed a grey towel from a pile on a shelf and went into the adjacent room. In the room, there were three shower-stalls along the wall, a long plastic bench on the other side, a few hooks over the bench, and a large laundry basket in the corner. He was grateful to find a few pairs of clothes folded neatly on the bench. After hanging his towel on the wall and putting his dirty clothes in the laundry basket, Thomas stepped into the shower and made the unpleasant discovery that the water only had one temperature: cold as ice.

He wasted no time in scrubbing off the dirt, drying himself with the towel, and getting dressed. The clothes were simple, if not boring. Grey t-shirt, grey sweatpants, grey socks. The clothes had clearly been worn many times before, there were holes and tears, and they sat loosely as if stretched out.

Thomas found Newt waiting for him in the changing room. His friend walked to the exit of the room, but Thomas told him to wait.

Newt turned to look at him. "What?"

"Come here, I need to tell you something," Thomas said.

Newt frowned but made his way over to Thomas.

"What?" He asked again.

"I don't want anyone to hear us, lean down so I can whisper," Thomas said. He thought it best to assume they were being spied on constantly. They were in a changing-room, meaning probably (hopefully) no cameras, but there could be wiretaps.

Newt tilted his head so Thomas could whisper into his ear without having to stand on his tiptoes.

Thomas told Newt about his meeting with Brenda, how she knew what they'd been talking about on the train. He was as quiet as possible, meaning his words probably wouldn't reach potential listening-devices. Of course, anyone listening in on them would know that they were whispering, as Thomas had literally announced it, but it wouldn't necessarily sound suspicious, it could just be taken as the two of them having something private to discuss. Brenda would obviously assume that Thomas was informing Newt of their meeting, but there wasn't much she could do about it. Thomas was sure she hadn't told anyone about their discussion, they would have been punished for conspiring against The Right Arm if she had, meaning she was the only one with a reason to be suspicious, and she couldn't openly confront them without revealing to the people she was working with that she'd withheld information from them.

When Thomas was done talking he stepped back to see that Newt was… smiling?

"What are you so happy about?" Thomas wondered.

"Well, frankly I'm a bit relieved."

"Relieved?" Thomas failed to see how anything he'd just said was relieving. "How come?"

"I thought... well, didn't you have a crush on her or something?"

"What?!" Thomas exclaimed, feeling himself blush, before regaining his composure. Had Newt thought they had gone away to make out? "First of all, I don't, and second, why do you care so much?"

It was now Newt's turn to go red. "Because she's one of our captors, that'd be Stockholm syndrome, and… Stockholm syndrome is… bad."

"Right," Thomas said, not knowing what else to say, "let's go."

Newt nodded, looking thankful to leave the conversation.

The two Gladers stopped outside the door, not knowing where to go. The only people they saw were people from The Right Arm, who either ignored them completely or sent occasional nervous glances their way. They didn't see the girls anywhere. Thomas guessed they must've been either in one of the two other rooms or in the space on the other side of the large wooden screen.

Let\s check over there, Thomas said, gesturing at the screen. The thing stopped maybe two meters from the wall, and they walked through easily. On the other side of the screen lay the sleeping quarters, with thirty or so bunkbeds in stacks of two or three. It didn't look very safe, especially where the beds were stacked three, as the wooden frames looked as if they would give out any minute and fall to the floor in heaps of splintered wood and lumpy mattresses. Sitting on what looked like the most unstable bed out of them all was none other than Teresa, her feet dangling meters over the floor, maybe so she could make a quick escape if (or rather when) the bed fell apart. She had been talking with Harriet, whom, more sensibly, had chosen to stay on ground level and was leaning against a bedpost as she looked up at Teresa.

"Hey, guys," Teresa said when she saw Thomas and Newt. Harriet turned toward them and gave a sharp nod.

"So, Newt told us Brenda wanted to talk to you," Teresa said.

"She did," Thomas responded.

 _"She knows what we were talking about on the train,"_ Thomas said telepathically. But something felt wrong, like the message didn't make it through. He repeated the message until it felt like he'd sent it, after trying several times. This took several minutes, during which Harriet and Newt started talking about something. Teresa had remained silent, as if sensing what Thomas was doing.

 _"What do you reckon we should do?"_ Teresa wondered. As soon as she had thought those words, a horrible pain hit Thomas, like a sledgehammer to the head. "Ow!" He doubled over, clutching his head instinctively.

Newt was at his side in an instant, asking him what was wrong.

"Telepathy, I think," Thomas mumbled, straightening up. The pain was gone as suddenly as it had struck, leaving only a faint throbbing sensation. He remembered something similar happening earlier. Something about his telepathy with Teresa had stopped working. Maybe WICKED had done it on purpose to make things more difficult for them, like how they had shut it off in The Scorch. He wondered if communicating telepathically with Aris would have the same effect. He was also wondering why Teresa didn't seem affected. But like earlier, he was left feeling exhausted, and he certainly wasn't in the mood for experimenting.

He sat down on the nearest bunkbed, leaning against the headboard and closing his eyes for a moment. He needed to rest, though he didn't feel like sleeping. The mattress sank as someone else sat down next to him, but Thomas didn't open his eyes to see who it was.

The silence was disturbed when someone approached them, footsteps sounding louder and louder. Thomas sat bolt upright, ready to deal with a threat.

He relaxed somewhat when he saw the supposed threat, a hunched over, elderly woman with a kindly face.

"Hi, Piper," Teresa said, smiling at the woman.

The woman -Piper- smiled in return.

"Hello, dears," she said, and then her gaze fell on Thomas and Newt, "I don't believe we've met, boys. I'm Piper."

Thomas and Newt introduced themselves hastily.

"It's nice to meet you. How are you feeling after the trip here?" She asked.

"we're good. A bit shaken up, I guess," Thomas responded, looking next to him, at Newt, who nodded at his statement.

"Yes, I heard what happened with the tunnel. Horrible, though I suppose it was only a matter of time before it happened." She looked down sadly. Thomas wondered if she had lost someone in the accident. Maybe a child, or a grandchild.

"Well, you can take a break from worrying about your safety, you're safe here," Piper assured them.

"That's… nice to hear," Thomas said. It _would_ have been nice to hear, if only he could believe it. They were under the constant threat of being killed, everyone knew it. He wasn't sure if the pretense was for their sake or for her own, but arguing would be impolite regardless.

"Now that you're all here," Piper said, "I can give you a tour of our home."

'Our home'. Not 'our base', or 'our headquarters'. Of course, it _was_ their home, they lived there after all, but Thomas hadn't thought of the place as someone's _home_.

"As you can see, this is the sleeping quarters. We usually turn all the lights off at ten, but you can stay up for as long as you like."

Piper walked toward the exit and they got up to follow her.

"This area serves as a common room," she said as they went into the large room they had entered first.

"Bathroom and showers," she gestured at the changing room, "office. Infirmary." The latter was behind the door on the far side of the building, that must've been where Sonya was.

"And the kitchen is in one of the other buildings," she finished.

Then she gestured for them to follow her as she walked up to a group of people.

They were young, in their late teens or early twenties. They looked weary, with bags under their eyes and sunken cheeks, but they looked happy enough despite it.

They had been talking to each other, but when Thomas and his friends approached they fell silent.

"Hi," said one of them. A boy, looking like the oldest of the bunch. "I'm Ethan."

He stretched out a hand, and the Gladers and Harriet shook it in turns.

Once the ice was broken, everyone else introduced themselves as well.

There were two boys: Ethan and Jules, and one girl: Rose.

"What's it like at WICKED?" Jules asked once the introductions were over, sounding genuinely curious.

"Well, it's not very nice," Thomas said, purposefully vague.

"I meant, like, details. Rose said they put you in a huge maze with werewolves in it, is that true?"

"We _were_ put in mazes," Harriet said, "but as far as I'm aware there weren't any werewolves."

"I _knew_ it! You lied to me," the kid glared at the girl, who laughed at him in response.

There was something about him that reminded Thomas of Chuck. Maybe it was because he was the youngest of the group, or something about the way he spoke, Thomas didn't want to think about it.

"What's it like here?" He asked, returning the previous question.

The trio shifted uncomfortably and glanced at each other. It was Jules who finally spoke.

"It's a bit scary, but not as much as out there," he gestured vaguely at the exit, "some of the adults say we're gonna have a cure to the virus soon, though."

"Are you not immune?" Teresa asked gently. The boy shook his head, looking down at his shoes.

"None of us are, otherwise _they_ would have taken us, too," Rose said, putting a protective arm around the younger boy. Her tone was bitter, and she eyed the Gladers with an almost disdainful expression. It struck Thomas that she was jealous, jealous that she hadn't been taken as a test subject for a set of trials that were literally wicked. He wanted to glare at the girl. He hadn't wanted to be treated like a lab rat, a variable in a trial. If she knew what he'd gone through…

No use thinking about it, he should be making allies, not enemies.

"Did someone tell you about the plan?" Asked Ethan, to Thomas' relief.

"Not really," Thomas said, hoping he was going to get an explanation that he could compare with the one they'd already gotten.

"Yes they did," Newt said, looking puzzled, "Vince said they'd send us into WICKED's second base so we could let them in."

If the others hadn't been looking at them, Thomas would have stepped on his friend's foot to get him to stop talking. What had he been thinking? Didn't he understand what Thomas was doing?

Ethan's eyes narrowed. Tension filled the air, like a barrier between the two groups.

Jules, maybe not the sharpest knife in the drawer, looked around at everyone in confusion. "What is it?" He asked.

"They were trying to trick us into telling them something," Rose explained, glaring at Thomas.

"No!" Thomas said hastily, "what I meant is that we were told that we were going to WICKED's base, but not how we're supposed to get there in the first place." Rose and Ethan, eyed him distrustfully. Jules shrugged in disinterest.

"I'm sure you'll be told the details soon enough, anyway," Ethan said, coldly.

The other youths turned away from the Gladers and went back to their old conversation. Thomas looked at his friends, but they didn't seem sure about what to do either.

Piper had left sometime during their conversation and was nowhere to be seen.

They ended up back in the sleeping quarters, where there was nobody to send angry glances at them every ten seconds.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to turn them against us," Newt said once they were out of earshot, "I wasn't thinking clearly."

"It's okay," Thomas said tiredly.

"No, it's not, we needed to befriend them and I messed up, I should have just let you guys do the talking."

Teresa cleared her throat meaningfully. Someone could be listening in on them, after all, and shouting their plans for anyone to hear was probably not the best idea. Newt grimaced, realizing his mistake, but he didn't say anything, probably in fear of saying something he shouldn't.

Thomas racked his brain for a way to fix the mess. He told himself over and over that they hadn't lost, it was merely that a complication had arisen.

Maybe if they gave the other youths some time for their anger to cool off, they could approach them and give some kind of explanation. They were not stupid, they couldn't tell them the whole thing was a misunderstanding. But maybe if they could reason with them, get them to see the Gladers' side.

If they accepted an apology, they should act as friendly as possible. They should avoid topics such as WICKED, The Right Arm, and their role in everything. They needed to build trust.

They would just have to wait.

Brenda eventually came and told them dinner was ready.

Prior to that, Thomas had stood silently thinking, Teresa and Harriet had been chatting in low voices, and Newt looked to have been sulking.

They followed Brenda into the main area, where everyone else sat, already eating. Most sat on the floor, as there weren't enough chairs.

A large, steaming pot of soup had been placed on one of the two tables in the room, along with a water-jug, cups, bowls, and cutlery.

After grabbing some food, Thomas led his friends over to the group of teens, figuring now was as good a time as any to reconcile

"Oh, it's you again," Rose said, sneering, "what do you want this time?"

"I want to apologize," Thomas said, "I wanted to see if what you said lined up with what we were already told. It was a mistake, and I understand now how it would look to you. But it's not because we don't trust you, it's just that everyone was always lying to us at WICKED, and I wanted to make sure The Right Arm would be honest."

This was not strictly the truth, but Thomas was not above exaggerating to gain sympathy in this form of situation.

Rose and Ethan were still looking apprehensive, but Jules smiled.

"Come on guys, let's give them another chance," he said to his friends

"On one condition," Rose said, "when you do your thing and the cure is made, you have to make sure we get some."

"Is one of you infected?"  
Ethan laughed dryly. "You really are sheltered, aren't ya? I'm pretty sure everyone in the world except you Munies is already infected in some shape or form. Now can you do this for us or not?"

Thomas didn't answer at first. What was he supposed to say? That he would try but that he couldn't be sure. Not with the way they were looking at him, hopefully, almost hungrily, believing he could save them. He didn't want to take their hope away like that.

"Yes," was what he ended up answering. He expected to regret saying it, but he didn't.

"Thank you," Jules said, looking ready to hug him.

Thomas should have felt guilty for giving the boy false hope, but he didn't. He decided that the hope would not be misguided. Of course, he would follow through on his promise. He was going to get the cure for Newt, and the girl in group B, the one who wasn't immune. Now these three. Just five people, no problem. He could do it.

But he realized something then. No, not really _realized_ , he knew it already, he just hadn't wanted to think about it. There were plenty of people who needed the cure, millions of them. Good people. Children and parents and siblings and friends, all of them living one day at a time, without any hope for the future, which they knew would only bring pain and sorrow and death. Why shouldn't he help them, too? What made them any different from the people he'd chosen to save, other than that he didn't know them?

He couldn't begin to imagine the effort and resources it would take to cure only five people. How much hadn't it already taken to get as far as they'd come now? And what about when they discovered the cure, once they knew how to create it. Would it become any easier then? What if they didn't have enough material? Enough people to transport and hand it out to people? Some people would have to be prioritized over others, especially if they had limited resources.

They needed to find the damn cure, and they needed to do it soon. Stress and frustration washed over him like a tsunami. If it hadn't been for that stupid Right Arm they would be close to completing the trial by now. They wouldn't be captured and split up. The plan to take over the WICKED-base would cause delays. There was no telling how close Vince and his associates would come to completing it, how many casualties there'd be, or how easily his imprisoned friends would get away from their captors. And if The Right Arm succeeded, well, he simply could not let that happen. Didn't they see that they were standing in the way of a solution?

The Right Arm thought they were the good guys, the righteous rebels who stood against the evil masterminds of WICKED, and if they won, they would easily solve everything and save the world.

In reality, they were nothing more than scared citizens in need of hope and protection, like the people he'd seen here, or fools like Vince, their power-hungry madman of a leader.

And here he was, sitting on the floor of an old school building, trying to appease three misguided teenagers while he waited for further instruction.

Waiting for them to make their move. Then it would be his turn, and he would come one step closer to checkmate.


	29. Understanding

Chapter 29. Understanding.

Their new acquaintances, Ethan, Rose, and Jules, turned out to be decent enough people, despite what they seemed like at first. Thomas could detect a tone of mistrust from the trio, but he could hardly blame them for that. Still, there was a painful tug at his heart when he noticed Jules looking at him with poorly masked fear.

He wondered how the Gladers would look to these people. They had discussed it, and the trio knew a bit about them, but it was mostly from stories told second- or third-hand. They had just as many, if not more, misconceptions as they had actual facts.

It had been a short conversation, thankfully. Thomas had had a hard time containing his increasing frustration with the new people. Not because they believed Group B had commandeered an army of helicopters to battle the terrible bat-monsters when escaping their maze -although that made him question their judgment- but because they sounded envious of them. Thomas couldn't understand how they could be so foolish; didn't they understand how terrible the Gladers and Glenners had had it during WICKED's experiments? Sure, they had been sheltered from the nightmare that was current society, but their memories had been taken away to ensure that ignorance. These people didn't know what it was like to see the doors of the Maze close in front of their very eyes, dooming everyone still inside to a horrible demise. They hadn't heard the doors close behind them as they ran into the near certain doom of the Maze, hoping against hope to save two friends. No, they had sat cooped up comfortably, playing board games while the Gladers ran from Grievers. What right did they have to envy Thomas? If anything, he should be the envious one.

But he buried his annoyance in some distant part of his mind, where he sent all the thoughts and feelings he couldn't allow himself to have. He kept telling himself that he could let them all out soon; when it was over. But when would that be? Or rather: How much longer could he keep it up before it all burst out of him like water from a broken dam?

When they ran out of things to talk about, Jules suggested they play a game. Thomas recognized the game, though he had no memories of playing it. It was a board game called Monopoly, where you tried to bankrupt your opponents. They played in three teams: Teresa and Harriet, Rose and Jules, and Thomas teamed up with Newt. Ethan was the judge.

Thomas was very bad at Monopoly, and Newt was even worse. They were out after ten minutes of gameplay. The other two teams fought to the bitter end, where Rose and Jules won narrowly. The epic battle between team T and H's metal dog and team R and J's top hat lasted for a very intense 45 minutes. Teresa blamed her loss on Thomas' terrible advise that he kept giving her once he was out of the game.

They played other board games -some Thomas recognized, some he didn't- until it was late at night. It was surprisingly fun, and Thomas had even forgotten that they were on different sides. They didn't realize how late it was until Ethan fell asleep and landed on the gameboard as if it were a pillow.

Teresa glanced over at the clock fixed on the far wall.

"Whoa, it's already one in the morning," she said.

"It is?" Rose looked at the clock herself. She turned to Jules. "It's way past your bedtime, little man."

"I don't have a bedtime!" Jules protested, "and don't call me 'little man', I'm almost twelve!"

"Whatever you say, now help me clean up this mess."

Jules put game pieces back in their boxes, while Rose put the boxes back in the bookshelf they'd been taken from. On her way back she kicked Ethan's leg and he woke up with a start. Newt folded up the gameboard Ethan had been using as a pillow. He went to put it back in its rightful place on the shelf, but he accidentally knocked over a mug of crayons, which thankfully didn't break on impact, but left colorful stains on the floor.

"Oh, bugger. Sorry." Newt grabbed a piece of paper from right next to the crayons' previous location and wiped away the stains. He put the wadded up paper in his pocket and put the crayons back in their mug. In the blink of an eye, he snatched a blue crayon and hid it up his sleeve. Newt looked around suspiciously, but Thomas didn't think anyone besides himself had noticed. Surely, if he wanted the crayon, he could have asked to borrow it. What was the point of using stealth?

As soon as Thomas lay down on the rickety bunk bed, he knew he was in for a sleepless night. He twisted and turned, but he could not find a comfortable position. It didn't help that the room was icy cold.

He had chosen the beds farthest right, the ones farthest from the people in the Right Arm. Harriet and Teresa were in the bunks opposite him, and Newt was above him. Thomas, knowing that a symptom of the Flare was poor balance, had offered to take the upper bunk, but that had made Newt climb up in defiance. He was probably asleep by now. The old bed-frames creaked at the slightest movement, and Thomas hadn't heard anything. He stared up at the mattress above. It was yellow, and it was peppered with holes as if someone had used it for target practice. A few strands of golden hair dangled in the air. Thomas turned to lay on his side, going through his plans for the hundredth time. 1. Pretend to go along with Vince's plan and go to WICKED's building. 2. Ambush everyone from the Right Arm who came to take over the place. 3. Trick Vince to bring the rest of the Gladers and the Glenners to the building. 4. Get rid of Vince and free everyone. 5. Complete the trial, get the cure, and live happily ever after.

He wished he could get it all over with immediately, but if they wanted it to seem like they had walked all the way to WICKED they would have to wait a few days.

They could just run off in the middle of the night, leave a note to explain where they'd gone, and pretend to still be cooperating by describing a time and general location for a meeting place to plan an attack on the people from WICKED. That might just work, but there was always the risk of setting off their captors. They may not be willing to kill the hostages, but there was nothing saying the hostages couldn't be harmed. They could be starved, or dehydrated, or beaten. Even if the immunes couldn't be harmed, there was the girl who wasn't immune. What right did he have to bring suffering to even one other person, even if it was to save another? She had the Flare too, though. Wouldn't she want to get the cure as soon as possible, even though she hadn't shown obvious symptoms yet? A few days could do all the difference.

He realized with horror that he was starting to think like WICKED. The thought repulsed him, especially as he knew he himself used to think like that when he was younger. _Put the kids in a maze, take their memories, send them to the Scorch, put them through a nightmare-simulation. It's for their own good, for the good of everyone. Unless we find the Cure they will all die, either by becoming Cranks or getting torn apart by them. We have to do this, there's no time for being gentle. Surely they would choose this for themselves if we asked them._

Maybe it was a righteous choice, the only moral choice there was. To someone on the outside of the variables, wouldn't it seem horrible of Thomas to oppose WICKED? He had worked for them, hadn't he? Right up until he was tossed to the lions in a meat-flavored sack without any memory of how he got there. Would it have been any different had his memories remained? Maybe he was a hypocrite, preaching that the ends justify the means until the means affected him.

The Right Arm was strongly against WICKED, of course. In the simulation, they had claimed to value isolation of the disease above risking immunes to find a cure, but they hadn't done anything except blow up WICKED and removing both alternatives. They had only been a variable designed by WICKED, though, and may or may not have had the actual ideals of the Right Arm, especially considering how they now wanted to do their own experimentation. That probably didn't make them much better than WICKED. It only made it stupid to side with them at all, since WICKED might be nearing a solution, while the Right Arm hadn't got past the theoretical textbook-research.

There was clearly no good alternative. WICKED was hardly the lesser of two evils, but logically they were the most likely to succeed. If the Right Arm really had some new method that was super effective, wouldn't they have given the information to the people with the resources to test it if they wanted to help people? That just showed how they cared about their own status. What's worse, they lured in scared civilians to do their dirty work for them. Thomas had no reason to trust the Right Arm more than WICKED.

He had become faintly aware of a rustling sound above him as he thought, but he had not paid it any mind until a wadded-up piece of paper landed on his ear.

He fumbled after it in his confusion. When he unfurled it, a crayon fell out, the blue one that Newt had taken earlier. He glanced up, but he figured the mattress above didn't have an explanation for him. He looked at the paper. One side had a colorful stain on it -it was clearly the paper Newt had used to wipe away the stain of crayon on the floor- the other side had two words written in the upper corner. **"You awake?"** It said in messy, blue text.

Thomas looked up again and saw a lock of hair that hung through the large hole in the mattress. He tugged at it lightly, and as soon as he had let go of it, it was snatched out of sight. That was as clear an answer as any. He wrote a question of his own below the first one, his usual neat handwriting warped by the thick crayon and uneven surface. **"What is it?"**

He scrunched up the paper with the crayon inside and pushed it through the hole in the mattress, where it was snatched up immediately.

When it was returned he was prepared and caught it easily.

" **Couldn't sleep. got bored. Ps do NOT pull my hair."**

Thomas smiled at the last part. If he could have, he would have done it again just to be annoying.

He answered. " **Do you want to talk, then? What about?"**

It felt a little silly to pass notes. Like they were two schoolchildren sitting through a boring lesson. It still seemed like a better option than trying pointlessly to go to sleep or dwelling on things. And he liked talking to Newt, even if it was by passing notes through a hole in a mattress.

 **"** **I dunno. Something nice,"** was the reply. Something nice? So not anything about the present, or the little they knew of the past, which left only…

 **"** **What are your plans for the future?"**

 **"** **I'm not sure. I never thought I'd survive long enough to have a future. What're you gonna do?"**

 **"** **I'm gonna go somewhere far away from WICKED, that's for sure. Maybe to some old, abandoned place, without Cranks to bother me."**

 **"** **Sounds good, mind if I come with?"**

 **"** **Of course I'd take you with me. I lack common sense, remember?"** Thomas had automatically assumed that Newt would come with him. He was surprised that Newt had felt the need to ask.

 **"** **Some old abandoned place it is then. How about a farm?"**

 **"** **Not a bad idea, as long as you know more about farming than I do, because I have no clue."**

 **"** **After I quit the Runners I spent some time helping out in the Gardens, and the others know stuff too."**

It looked as if several words had been blotted out at the beginning of the message as if Newt couldn't decide which words to use, but what really caught Thomas' attention was the last part. _The others._

Of course they would take the others with them —the ones willing to come, anyway— but he had been caught up in the moment, picturing himself and Newt escaping to another part of the world and starting a new life there, just the two of them. A stupid thought, really; there was no way they could restore and maintain an old farm all by themselves. But for some reason, the idea appealed to him. A sort of warm, comfortable sensation spread through his chest.

 **"** **I'm sure it'll all work out, as long as you teach me about farming,"** Thomas wrote hastily upon realizing he was taking too long to answer.

 **"** **Or you could always be a housewife, if that doesn't work out."**

Thomas snorted. **"Are you proposing to me?"**

 **"** **I didn't say MY housewife, I figured you'd get back together with Brenda or something."**

 **"** **For the last time, that was a crush, which I'm long-since over."**

 **"** **Sorry if I'm intruding. I just don't want you to get hurt. I know it's none of my business though. You're allowed to like whoever, and you don't have to tell me if you don't want to."**

 **"** **Hey, shank, I know, we're cool."**

In truth, Thomas was actually pretty annoyed that Newt never believed him about this, but he couldn't help but feel touched at knowing Newt didn't want him to get hurt, or rather, him admitting it outright. He supposed that could explain why Newt seemed to care so much about his love life.

Thomas waited for the next message, but it never came. He didn't hear the crinkling sound of paper, or anything else, for that matter. He guessed the conversation was over. He listened for the tell-tale deep breaths of sleep, but all he heard was the noise from the others in the room.

He still didn't feel tired, and the creaks of the beds and the snores of the sleeping people hardly helped.

He was fairly certain he managed to snag an hour or two of sleep, but his thoughts were too hazy to be sure.

When he noticed people starting to get up, he followed suit. He didn't have to look at the clock to know that it was very early. The little daylight that made it through the grimy, high windows was faint and without much warmth. The yawning spread through the building like an epidemic.

People buzzed around the room like busy bees, completing their morning chores. Thomas stood against the wall of the large room, feeling a title awkward. He noticed immediately how everyone moved around with purposeful ease; they had clearly been doing this for a long time, long enough for the routine to settle into muscle memory.

Breakfast was a thin, grey porridge, which was surprisingly good, despite appearances.

Thomas felt much happier with a full stomach, and the grogginess of semi-consciousness had dissipated as he ate.

He felt sore from the physical exertion the day before, but that only made him more restless. He wanted to do something —he wanted to run.

He settled for chatting.

Soon after they had helped clean their bowls, Jules ran up to Thomas like an excited puppy, Ethan and Rose following closely after. The young boy talked happily about how there would probably be enough snow to build a snowman this year. There had apparently not been a lot of snow the year before, or the years preceding it.

The group (Thomas, his friends from the mazes, and the Right Arm trio) sat down and talked about many things. Nothing about the Flare, or the solar flares, or anything like that. It was nice.

Except for one detail: Newt was clearly having a bad episode. By the looks of it, he'd gotten even less sleep than Thomas, and he looked much worse for wear than Thomas did, if the bathroom-mirror was to be believed. His eyes were in shadow, giving him a haunted look. He said nothing, save for a few one-syllable words. Even their new friends sent him worried glances, though that was likely them fearing for their own safety in the presence of a Crank.

Hours passed, and Thomas' unease grew. Newt didn't snap out of it like he usually did, instead, he began rubbing at his temples, as if he had a headache. Thomas wanted to say something, but he didn't want to cause a scene.

An unlikely savior came in the form of Brenda, telling them Piper needed help with the laundry, which was to be washed outside in a nearby stream.

"We'll do it," Thomas volunteered, gesturing at himself and Newt.

"Good," Brenda said shortly and left them just as efficiently. She seemed to be avoiding them.

Thomas went to Newt, who hadn't reacted at all to what was being said, and helped him up from where he'd been sitting on the floor.

"Come on," Thomas clapped his friend on the back, "fresh air will be good for you."

They met up with Piper, and Thomas helped the old woman carry the large laundry basket.

The outside air was crisp, without much wind, and the sky was dark with clouds. Jules would probably get to build his snowman soon.

The stream was a few minutes walk from the gym, on the opposite side of where they'd come.

The stream itself ran free and clear, too wild to freeze over. Thomas did not look forward to coming into contact with the cold water, which would undoubtedly give him hypothermia, or at the very least frostbite.

He stalled for as long as he could, arranging the basket of clothes carefully after putting it down in the frosty grass.

Piper smiled at him sympathetically. "I can take it from here, boys. There's an old racetrack somewhere around here, you go have fun."

"Thank you, but won't you get cold if you wash all of this by yourself?" Thomas asked.

"No, no. You should have been here before the solar storms, this is nothing compared to that, and I'm used to the cold. You've been shivering since you stepped out the door," Piper said.

Thomas thanked her again and led Newt away to where the racetrack was supposed to be.

The track was simple; a large oval of cracked plastic with grass sprouting through wherever it could. The ground was white with frost, and Thomas had a hard time finding it.

"Look, there it is!" Thomas said to his silent companion.

No response.

"Do you want to run around the track for a bit? We could race each other."

Silence.

"We'll both come down with a cold if we don't do anything to stay warm.

Nothing.

"Are you listening to me?" Thomas stepped closer. Newt wasn't even looking at him, he was looking at his own shoes.

Thomas cupped his face, making Newt look up at him.

"Are you listening to me?" He asked again.

Newt mumbled something in response and moved away from him. At first, he thought it might be to sulk, but he was moving towards the racetrack.

Without another word, he started running.

Newt ran fast despite his limp, though it made him run in a slightly odd fashion.

Thomas took off after him, moving just a bit quicker. With his head start, Newt ran an entire circle before Thomas caught up. He slowed his pace so they ran side by side.

Running felt wonderful, like he was a bird soaring through the sky, free and unbothered.

It didn't last for long. Thomas ran slower and slower, trying to match Newt's tempo.

His friend was getting unsteady, veering left and right as he ran.

"Hey, Newt, maybe we should take a break!" Thomas called.

Rather than slow to a stop, Newt picked up the pace, leaving a surprised Thomas behind.

He ran faster and faster, stumbling and swerving, but completely unfazed by it.

Thomas ran faster, trying to catch up to his friend before he got hurt, yelling at him to slow down to no avail.

He was closing in, but Newt still ignored him.

Thomas considered running in front of him, forcing him to stop, but Newt might just run him over in this state.

He could grab him, physically stopping him, though he might end up accidentally tackling his friend in the rush,

Before he could make up his mind, Newt stumbled after taking a false step on his bad foot.

His momentum caused him to fall forward, roll, and land in a heap in the frost.

Thomas called his friends name as he ran up to him, crouching by his side.

Newt groaned but insisted that he was alright. He slapped away the hand Thomas offered him and shakily got up on his own, putting as little weight as possible on his bad leg.

"Stupid bloody limp!" Newt shouted, glaring at his leg, "I wish I'd climbed higher up." His voice faltered.

"You don't mean that," Thomas mumbled, more to himself than to Newt.

"Oh, and how would you know?" Newt said venomously, and Thomas made the mistake of not answering.

"That's right, you don't. You don't know me. You know nothing, Tommy."

"Look, I don't know what to say to you," Thomas said, before Newt could continue, "you switch back and forth between being like you've always been and telling everyone and everything that you hate them. I know you've been through hell, and you're still going through it, and I want to help you, but you never let me. You either act like it's nothing or yell it in my face, and I don't know what to do, okay, I'm not perfect —far from it— I don't know what you need me to say or do, and you never tell me. All I want right now is make sure you don't die, and you promised to help me with that. Carrying all this hate around only makes everything worse. I'll help you work it all out if you let me, and if you can't bring it up now, I'll wait until you're ready. Just don't carry it around like this, please."

Newt stared at him, his expression betrayed nothing, and he didn't say anything. Then he wrapped his arms around Thomas and held him as if he were a lifejacket in the middle of an endless ocean. Thomas guessed he must've said the right thing. What he'd said was the truth, but he had been unsure of what reaction he would receive. Newt needed to tell Thomas what was wrong, and Thomas needed to do what it took to fix it. So that's what he would do; he would not wait for weeks or days, he would wait until nightfall, then they would go, and Thomas would save Newt.


	30. Escape

_Author's note:_

 _Chapter thirty is finally here, and I apologize for the time it took. I can't promise to update more often, but I'll try. I suggest you follow the story if you can and want to, so you can see when I update. Please tell me in a review if there's anything I can improve upon._

Chapter 30. Escape.

"Are you sure you know what to say?"

"Yes. 'They're sorry, but they couldn't wait any longer. They're telling WICKED that the group got attacked by cranks and the three of them managed to get away, find the train-station, take a train, and find WICKED from there. You can tell me the plan and send me in with Sonya, but you have to do it within a day or they'll tell WICKED what you're up to.' Is that good enough for you?"

"It's great."

"And you have your old clothes so they won't think it's suspicious?"

"Snagged them from the laundry basket. We'll get changed and leave immediately."

"And you know the way?"

"We'll have to follow the train tracks. We can't see them from here, so we'll just head in the direction the train was going and hope for the best. Newt, Teresa, let's go. See you tomorrow, Harriet."

After Harriet had wished them good luck, they went to the changing room —where Thomas had hidden their old clothes— and got changed.

"Are you done?" Teresa asked from the shower-room.

"Affirmative," Thomas replied, and Teresa came out.

Their old clothes —camouflage pants and jacket and a bulletproof vest over long-sleeved shirts and sweatpants— were now clean (though still uncomfortably damp from washing), which would have seemed suspicious to WICKED, but thankfully they wouldn't have to lie to them about where they'd come from, which meant the three of them wouldn't have to roll around on the cold ground to get their clothes dirty.

"Are you ready?" Thomas asked.

"Yes," Teresa said. Newt nodded.

"Good, then we get out of here as quietly as possible and run like we're being chased by Grievers."

Moving through the building was slow, scary work. They didn't want to take their shoes off, which meant one heavy step could give them away, and they could be discovered at any time.

Thomas had to keep reminding himself that it was the middle of the night, and everyone was probably asleep. Nobody had cared that the captives were staying up late, and nobody had heard them discussing strategy. Even if there were recording devices, they hadn't said anything incriminating that wasn't included in the cover-story Harriet would provide.

And then, after what somehow seemed like both a microsecond and a year, they stood in front of the door.

Thomas' hand was sweaty, the doorhandle slippery under his grasp, and he pulled it down slowly, fearing discovery if even the faintest sound was made.

But what if the door was locked? What then? If it had been locked by a key, hidden away somewhere safe…

The door opened. A gust of cold air entered the room, piercing Thomas' bare hand with tiny daggers of ice.

The door made no sound, and neither did Teresa when she passed through it, weightless like a shadow uniting with the darkness outside.

Newt almost tripped over the threshold when it was his turn to go, but he managed to steady himself without much trouble or noise. Thomas went last, closing the door with the same care as he'd opened it.

They had done it. They were out, and now they would be on their way to WICKED. The only problem was that they didn't know the way. And that they couldn't see anything. And the cold. And—

"What are you doing out here?"

A flashlight was pointed at them suddenly, and Thomas could see the person holding it.

Rose.

"I'm waiting," she persisted. A small knife gleamed in her hand.

Thomas hadn't seen her go outside, but, when he thought about it, neither could he recall seeing her for a while.

"Look, Rose." Teresa took a step toward her, empty hands held up to show she was unarmed.

"We're not trying to escape from the Right Arm, or betray them in any way—"

"Really? It looks to me as if you're doing exactly that."

"We're _not_. We just don't have the time to be waiting around uselessly. We're initiating the plan now."

"It's all because of him, isn't it?" Rose pointed at Newt. "You don't care that you could mess up everything and end up with no cure for anyone. You're risking the lives of everyone just for him."

"Maybe we are," Thomas said, "can you really blame us? Wouldn't you do the same for the people you care about?"

"The people I care about are either dead or dying because WICKED wasted so much time on nothing. Or maybe that was just you ruining it by not thinking logically or knowing when it's too late."

Thomas was about to say something angry and probably hurtful, but Teresa responded quicker.

"It's not like we're just running off without thinking. We thought it all through and decided that the goal can be accomplished while we save a few days. And we're not just thinking about our own friends. We're thinking about you, the people here, everyone. You must realize what a few extra days could mean for us all."

There was a tense silence as Rose processed the information.

"How do I know you're not just running away?"  
"Because the Right Arm has our friends. Do you think we'd just abandon them?" Thomas asked.

"You could be doing just that, for all I know. And even if you're going where you're supposed to be, what's to stop you from telling WICKED all about us?"

Teresa sighed. "Just hear me out, please. We can't tell you that we won't tell WICKED about the Right Arm, because that is exactly what we're going to do."

Rose stepped back, surprised, then she remembered herself and scowled at Teresa, pointing the knife at her. Thomas was equally surprised that Teresa had told Rose, but now it was too late to take back. _Surely Teresa must have a plan_

"We hate WICKED as much as you do, but they are close to finding the cure, and the Right Arm is not. They might think they have found a way, but the world can't afford for us to give up and start over from square one."

"'Close' are they? That's what they told my mom five years ago, and she got infected because of it. Those bastards are evil and I don't trust them or anyone on their side."

Teresa made to put her hand on Rose's shoulder, starting to say something comforting, but Rose waved the knife threateningly at her.

"Back off," she spat. "All of you, go back inside. If you behave, I might decide not to tell on you."

"Rose, please," Teresa said, "don't you understand-"

Rose yanked Teresa towards her in a swift movement, and before anyone had time to react, she was pressing the knife against Teresa's throat.

"Inside. _Now."_

"Alright, we're going," Thomas said, inching towards the building, "there's no need for anything rash."

With that, he leaped at the two girls, grabbing the knife by the blade.

The knife was not as sharp as it could have been, but nonetheless, it cut through his skin like it was made of butter. Every fiber of his being told him to let go, but he kept trying to pull the knife away from Teresa. Rose had been caught off guard, and by the time she reacted it was too late. Teresa elbowed her in the nose and jumped out of the way. Thomas let go of the blade as soon as Teresa was out of the way, letting Rose stumble backward from Teresa's blow.

The flashlight fell from Rose's hand, landing so that it shone on her.

She looked wild; her hair was in her face, sticking to the blood pouring out of her nose in a steady stream. Her dark eyes were narrowed and hateful.

She came at Thomas, about to stab him in the face.

Thomas readied himself to dodge the knife and tackle Rose, but a blurred figure flung itself at her, taking her down to the ground with it. Although Thomas' eyes had adjusted to the darkness, he couldn't make out much more than silhouettes

The fight ended quickly, with Newt —because of course, it was Newt— winning. He wrenched the weapon out of Rose's hand with enough force to break it, had she been unlucky.

He then stood up, taking her with him, and held the knife against her throat, as she had done to Teresa.

He pressed the knife dangerously hard to her throat, and soon a few droplets of blood dripped from the already bloodied blade.

"Newt, be careful," Teresa said, sounding fearful.

Thomas felt equally afraid. He didn't have to see Newt's face to know it looked murderous, he could hear it in his breathing, and he thought for a moment that he might actually kill Rose.

But nobody was more scared than Rose. Thomas could see her eyes were wide with terror, and he heard her rapid breathing. She tried to push at the arm holding the blade, but it would not budge. She whimpered as the knife pressed against her throat, and tears from pain and fear gleamed in her eyes.

"Newt, stop," Thomas said, "you're going to kill her if you don't stop. I know you don't want to do that."

Newt didn't stop. Thomas was afraid he was beyond listening even to him.

But then he relaxed, ever so slightly. Thomas put a hand on the arm holding the knife and pulled it away from Rose carefully.

The girl sat down heavily in the snow, clearly in shock, and when Teresa crouched next to her to examine the wound, she didn't protest.

Newt had seemingly snapped out of his rage, his face changing from anger, to shock, to disgust. The knife fell from his trembling hand and landed in a pile of snow.

Thomas picked up the flashlight —which still shone upward— and looked over it briefly. It was not a normal flashlight, as it turned out. It was a cell, about a decimeter long and half as broad, bigger than the newer models Thomas could remember seeing, but he could remember the basic functions that applied to most cells. He swept his finger over the slippery surface over the light and it disappeared, clearly his memory wasn't perfect. He swept the other way, and the light returned, in a broader, brighter ray.

He hadn't expected to see as much blood as he did. The snow was crimson, and Thomas' own hands were bleeding, which he had forgotten. He had assumed the wetness on his hands was snow, but now that he could see it, he felt it. The cuts —though not very deep— stung, and blood oozed.

Thomas put the cell in the breast pocket of his jacket so it would shine through and scooped up a handful of snow to numb his hands.

"We need to get out of here," Thomas said, "we'll have to take her with us. And we have to get rid of the blood in the snow."

He knelt on the ground and began shoveling the snow to the side with his hands. If they got it out of the way, maybe covered it up with more snow…

"Oh no, the snow," Teresa said, "they'll see our footsteps in the snow."

"We can't go back now. We will have to get there before they catch up to us," Thomas said.

He stood up, looking down at his handiwork (or rather, footwork, as he had kicked fresh snow over the small pile, figuring it would be difficult to hide blood with bleeding hands). He couldn't see any of the bloodied snow, and neither would anyone else unless the upper layer thawed.

Rose's absence would obviously be noted, but they might believe she went willingly, though definitely not if they saw blood on the ground.

Thomas looked around to make sure everything was ready. He had Rose's cell and knife. The blood was gone. Rose stood, looking frightened, with a cloth tied around her wound. Her nose had stopped bleeding, and the worst of the blood had been cleaned up. She wasn't protesting or trying to escape, thankfully. Teresa had a tight grip on her arm and looked ready to go. Newt looked resolute.

Thomas took off in a run, going along the side of the building and continued to the side. The others followed close behind.

He could see the entrance to the collapsed tunnel, nothing more than a pile of dirt and rubble. Wait… was that…? As they got closer he could see it clearly. There was a body lying on the ground.

That woman, the one whose husband had died in the tunnel. Jenny.

Thomas swallowed hard and turned to the right. They were trying to follow the train tracks. They couldn't actually _see_ said train tracks, but their best bet would be to go in the direction they seemed to lead. It was a bad plan at best. Thomas regretted not looking more thoroughly for a map, or trying to get the information from someone.

But they had someone. Surely, Rose knew something.

"Rose!" Thomas called, "which way should we go?"

"It's straight ahead and then right when we see the old mines," she called back.

Thomas was surprised that she had answered him directly. There was a possibility that she was trying to trick them, but they couldn't do much to make sure it was the right way except for going there.

After running for an hour (according to Thomas' watch) the landscape had gone back to forest. Birches and spruces grew thick and roots ran across the ground like wooden veins. It hardly helped that they were in near-complete darkness, lit only by the one flashlight they had. There was barely any snow in the forest, a small relief. The footprints they had left before were of little importance, as they ran in the most probable direction anyway.

They had slowed to a jog, as much out of tiredness as concern for their safety.

"How much further is it?" Teresa asked between heavy breaths.

"We'll be at the mines in maybe two hours. I'm not sure how long it'll take to get to WICKED from there."

They didn't stop moving. They would speed up their jog to a run or slow it to a walk, but they never stopped.

Needless to say, it was exhausting, and the only thing that allowed Thomas to continue was his fear of getting caught, of being stopped when they were so close.

They turned right when they saw the mines, which, for the record, were three hours away, rather than two.

The sky had turned a shade lighter. The soon would be up soon, and the people from the Right Arm would rise with it. They would come looking for them, trying to catch up before the Gladers got away.

They had to get to WICKED'S base before it was too late, but their energy seemingly disappeared along with the darkness.

They walked for a while, but soon enough they could not even manage that.

They stopped at a small stream, chancing a drink of water.

Thomas sat down on the frozen grass. _Just five minutes,_ he told himself, _then I can keep going._

He checked the cell to see how much battery it had. It was around eighty percent, which meant it would last for at least two more days' worth of usage.

In a fit of curiosity, Thomas decided to turn on the screen. There might be something useful on it, and if not, he wanted to see if it had any of the apps and games he remembered.

He swiped with two fingers, from the middle to each side, but a purple lock-symbol flashed on the screen, before disappearing a few seconds later.

"Hey, Rose, what's the password?"

She scoffed at him. "I'm not telling you."

"Why? Do you have secret information on it?"

"No, of course not."

"Then why can't I see what's on the cell?"

"Fine. You can see for yourself that there's nothing on it. The password is pineapple."

Thomas swiped at the screen again, and when the lock appeared, he repeated the password to it.

The screen split and Thomas unfolded it to full size. The thin screen was around fifteen centimeters on each side.

Thomas was delighted to recognize several of the items on the cell. He wished he had more time, but if everything went well he would have plenty of time to play solitaire later. Instead, he looked for anything that could help them. There wasn't an app that would show their location, nor any pieces of information written anywhere. He went through the pictures as a last resort. Some of the first were of a younger Rose together with a fair-haired woman who could only be her mother. There were pictures of snowfall, and animals, and more recent pictures of Rose together with Ethan and Jules.

Rose had been observing him as he looked through her cell, but it wasn't until he went through the pictures that she started to look uneasy.

"That's enough," she said. She tried to yank it from Thomas' grasp. "That's private."

She was right, but Thomas considered the possibility to find useful information that could save the world to override Rose's right to privacy. Said girl tried once again to take the screen, but in the struggle that ensued, she managed to do the opposite of what she wanted. She accidentally changed to a different picture. She froze when she saw what she'd done, and then picked up a nearby rock, intending to break the cell, but she was stopped, and Thomas saw the photo of a map.

Over there was the small town that the Right Arm resided in. There were the mines. He could also see the small square drawn sloppily in the middle of an empty field, titled WICKED. It was not located east of the mines.

"What was your plan? To get us lost in the forest?" Thomas stood up, showing Newt and Teresa the map.

"N-no," Rose stuttered.

"Really? Because we wanted to go here" Thomas pointed at the WICKED-building on the map, "but you led us here," he moved his finger to the other side of the map. According to landmarks they'd passed, they had been moving east and a little south.

"We have to go right now," Teresa said, "it's already eight o'clock, they'll be out in the forest by now."

Just as Thomas got ready to take off, Rose sat down on the ground, arms crossed.

"Come on, we're going," Teresa said in frustration.

Rose shook her head, trying to look tough, but failing to conceal her fear.

"If you don't get up right now we'll tie you to a tree and leave you here in the middle of nowhere," Thomas threatened.

Rose swallowed hard, but didn't stand.

"You don't have any rope," she said.

"We could beat you unconscious and leave you for a bear to find," Newt offered, stepping closer to Rose.

She paled and stood up immediately.

"Fine! Let's go, then. It's not as if you're gonna get very far."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Thomas folded the cell and pocketed it, then he started running and the others followed suit.

"You idiots really thought they would leave you free to escape? They put trackers in your food. They'll be here any second."

Was she bluffing? She must be, surely. She hadn't done anything but lie and try to slow them down, this was no different. And if she was actually telling the truth, well then, what better motivation to run for all they were worth?

They ran back the way they'd come, not slowing down, and not caring about constantly getting whipped in the face by plants.

The sun had risen low in the sky, illuminating the roots that would have tripped them before.

They ran for minutes or hours or days. It was impossible to tell which because they all seemed the same at that time.

The only thing that stayed crystal clear was the path. Thomas knew where they were, and where they were going. They would return to the mines and run northeast from there. It shouldn't take too long after that —two hours at most— and then they would be safe, albeit only for a short while.

They were getting close to the mines. Thomas recognized the enormous boulder that they had run past hours before.

That was when he heard _them._

He stopped dead at the sound of voices. The others had stopped, too, and he knew they could hear the voices from the other side of a large bush. Teresa had put her hand over Rose's mouth to keep her from giving their location away.

Thomas couldn't hear specific words, but he knew that the people they belonged to were from the Right Arm, and they would be discovered soon unless they came up with a plan.

Maybe if they backtracked until they were well hidden, and then ran around the people looking for them. They would expect the Gladers to go to WICKED's base, though, so they would have to take a path that _wouldn't_ be expected. If they ran north and went to their destination from that angle, they would be less likely to have any unfortunate encounters.

Thomas was mouthing at the others to go back the way they'd come, but it was too late.

Thomas recognized Ethan, and that jerk John, and he could remember seeing the third man, though he didn't know his name.

The three of them had stepped around the bush and stared at the Glader for one silent second.

Teresa was the first to react. She shoved Rose at the newcomers. Ethan caught her and started asking her questions, as the other two lunged at the three Gladers.

They ran before they were caught, not back, but to the right. North. They were less likely to encounter other search parties that way. They wouldn't want to escape one group just to run into the arms of another. If they could escape this group, in the first place.

The Gladers were fast, but so were their pursuers. One moment the gap between them grew, the next it shrunk.

After a while, something hissed through the air, past Thomas' arm. A bullet, he realised. They were being shot at now.

"Ethan! Put the gun away!" The unnamed man shouted, "you could kill one of them!"

"We don't need the Crank, though. If I shot him, maybe the others would stop," Thomas heard Ethan say.

"No! We're not killing anybody," the man protested.

There were no more shots being fired after that, but that didn't end their troubles.

After running for a long while, Teresa tripped over a root and fell.

They were going to get her now. Thomas stopped. Maybe they could fight their enemies off.

"No! Don't stop! Keep going!" Teresa shouted.

Thomas resumed his running, not knowing what to do but obey. He knew they wouldn't hurt her. They needed her, after all. He felt ashamed for just leaving her, but what better option was there?

He kept going. He was fuelled by adrenaline and not much else. He hadn't eaten or drunk for many hours, and it had been over a day since he last slept. He would probably collapse into a miserable heap when he stopped running, but he was willing to pay that price if only he made it to safety.

He had to keep constant watch off the ground in front of him. If he tripped it would all be over, and the hours of running would have been for nothing. The only thought he allowed himself to focus on was the path. He would be a lousy runner if he failed because he lost his way. He wanted to check the map again, but he couldn't take his eyes off the ground, so he would just have to trust his memory.

They were close —only a few minutes away— when Newt went down with a yell. Thomas hadn't seen what had happened, but it hardly mattered. It was not the same as when Teressa had been taken. She was an immune, a valuable resource. Newt was a Crank (or not far off at least), and he didn't matter to the Right Arm's plans beyond being used as a hostage.

That man had seized Newt. He forced him up from the ground and pressed the tip of a knife to his throat. The threat seemed unnecessary, as Newt didn't put up a fight like he normally would have. At first, Thomas thought he was biding his time to break free when least expected, but he seemed to be genuinely devoid of energy.

Thomas rushed over to help but was cut off by the other man. John, that horrible, ugly jerk who had threatened to kill Newt before on the train, and now blocked Thomas' way.

He tried to get around the man, but he was blocked each time.

He tried to punch the man, but the few blows that weren't blocked had no visible effect.

John didn't try to grab him or even fight him. He was just toying with Thomas.

"Take him back to the others, I'll get the last brat," John said to his colleague.

As soon as the other man was out of sight, John said: "the cell, hand it over."

Thomas stopped fighting, confused.

"There's a tracker in it, you brat! Hand it over."

Thomas removed the cell from his pocket reluctantly, and John grabbed it immediately and tossed it over his shoulder. Thomas stared at him in surprise. So Rose had lied again, then. The tracker hadn't been inside anything except his own pocket.

John shoved him. "Run, you stupid kid! Go!"

Thomas stayed where he was. Was this some sort of trick? It didn't matter, he couldn't leave Newt.

"What are you waiting for?"

"I won't let you hurt my friends," Thomas said.

"Nobody is going to hurt your stupid friends! Go now!"

And Thomas did go. He ran the rest of the way, no more than ten minutes. His thoughts were blurry and heavy, and he was much too tired to consider the possibility of a lie. His friends were safe. He would save them all.

The forest suddenly gave way for a large field. Empty save for one building, which was white and much smaller than WICKED's other base.

He ran out onto the wet grass, heedless of hidden traps. There wasn't a fence, nothing stopping him from reaching the front door. He sat down against the wall and sagged with relief. He had made it. He might have laughed, but his whole body felt too heavy to move.

Thomas didn't mind. He allowed the darkness to wash over him and take him away.


	31. Calm

Chapter 31. Calm.

The place Thomas woke up in was warm and very white. This confused him, as he could distinctly recall being somewhere else when he'd fallen asleep. He didn't know what was going on, but he didn't care all that much. He looked up at the ceiling. White as snow. Snow… running on snow… and grass… in a forest, headed to… WICKED!

All his knowledge came rushing back, and he sat bolt upright. He was in a bed, in what looked to be an infirmary. His wounded palms were bandaged. He had been covered by several blankets, and when he'd sat up they'd fallen from his upper body. The room was very cold without the blankets, and Thomas shivered. He was wearing a shirt he didn't recognize. It was light blue, thick, and made of wool. The place had to be incredibly cold if he froze in that.

The room was empty save for Thomas, but he had to tell someone about the Right Arm so they could prepare. He shoved the blankets off his legs and stood up. His dark pants were made out of wool like the shirt, and they didn't shut out the cold either.

He walked through the room unhindered and opened the door. It wasn't locked like he'd expected it to be.

He took a tentative step out into the corridor, then another. Nobody came to stop him.

He walked to the left, where he saw a door. He reached out to open it when a voice called out his name.

Thomas flinched and turned to see the man who'd just stepped around the corner. He looked surprised to see Thomas.

"You shouldn't be walking around," he said, coming closer. "Come." He went into the infirmary and Thomas followed him.

The man introduced himself as Mike. He seemed pleasant enough. He looked to be in his mid-twenties, and he was a bit shorter than Thomas. He explained that Thomas had passed out from exhaustion when he'd arrived ten hours ago, but that he was healthy otherwise.

He asked Thomas if he knew where the others who been sent out were. Thomas briefly considered telling him the whole story, but instead, he said it was important and he needed to speak with whoever was in charge. He had apparently been asleep for ten hours, and he didn't know how much time he had left. He had given the Right Arm one day to initiate their plan, so they could show up at any minute.

After making sure Thomas was feeling well, Mike had nodded and fished out a walkie-talkie from his pocket. He told someone called 'Jo' to 'gather everyone in the big room'.

The big room was a conference room with a large, oval table. Half the places were filled, with more people arriving every few seconds.

When Thomas looked at the people sitting at the table, he wondered if he had died outside the building, because why else would he see dead people?

There were Zart and Ben, and-

"Alby?" Thomas asked. He must be dead. He had seen Alby torn apart by Grievers, with no chance for survival.

The older boy turned towards him.

"It's you," Alby said coldly, eyes narrowed as he stood up and walked closer to Thomas.

Thomas wondered if Alby would punch him, or straight-up murder him. He didn't know what Alby knew, or what he had heard about Thomas. He didn't even know how he had survived the Grievers.

Alby —who had stopped in front of Thomas— seemed to tower over him, despite not being much taller.

"What are you doing here? Where are Newt and Minho?" He demanded, glaring daggers.

"I— I don't— how…?" Thomas couldn't get a sentence out.

"Where are they?! What did you do to them?!" Alby's voice rose to a shout.

"Fine! They're fine," Thomas said.

"Then where—"

"Alby! Don't yell at the poor boy. He was just about to explain everything," Mike chided. "Sit down, both of you."

Alby went back to his seat without complaint, looking furious. Thomas sat down on an empty chair on the other side of the table.

Once his surprise had faded and his thoughts had organized themselves, Thomas remembered what Rat Man had told them, that the boys who had been taken by Grievers or trapped out in the Maze were waiting for them at the second facility. He could see Zart, and Dave, and the other boys who had been thought to be dead when the walls hadn't closed and the Grievers took one person every night. He couldn't see Chuck anywhere. Maybe he had actually died. The thought made Thomas feel strangely empty.

Next to Zart was Ben, who was exchanging whispers with the boy on his left, occasionally glancing over at Thomas. He had been banished —thrown out into the Maze as the door closed right in front of his terrified face. It had been Thomas' fault, to a certain extent. He shouldn't have walked out alone into the Deadheads. Then Ben might not have found him. He might have recovered from the Changing and gone back to normal. At least he wasn't dead, unless this was another illusion. Unless Thomas was still in a simulation. He shuddered at the thought.

"Alright, everyone. Settle down," said a woman at the end of the table. She was middle-aged, with dark skin and braided, dark hair. There was something familiar about her, but Thomas couldn't remember ever seeing her before.

Everyone quieted down. The table was crowded now, and there must've been at least eighty people in the room. The large table had an extra row of benches on one side just to fit everyone in.

The majority of the gathering was made up of teens. Around twenty-five boys and twenty girls. So many people who were believed to be gone. It seemed unfair that Thomas —who hadn't even been in the Glade for two weeks— should be the one find all these lost people. He barely recognised half of the boys, and knew the names of fewer. He wanted all the problems to be solved immediately so everyone could be reunited with their friends, and their siblings, and their partners.

"Welcome, Thomas," said the woman. "I'm Joan, and I'm the head physician here. Now, I believe you had something you wanted to tell us."

"Yeah, right," Thomas said. He stood up and cleared his throat.

"As you probably know, group A and B —the parts of the groups that were at the other facility, I mean— were sent on a trial and told to go here." Some of the people nodded, looking at him with impatience, or worry, or curiosity. He looked at Alby, and saw that he was staring eagerly at Thomas. He wanted to know who was still alive, no doubt.

"Shortly after the trial began, we were attacked and captured by the Right Arm."

There was a collective gasp at this.

"We were taken to an underground bunker and put in a cell. Shortly thereafter I was taken to their second base by train, along with a few others. They wanted us to help them seize control of this building. I wasn't informed about the details, but presumably, they wanted us to let them inside so they could take all the people here out."

"You say 'us', but you are the only one here," Joan pointed out.

"Our plan was to pretend to be on their side until we could subdue them and free our friends, but they were taking too long, so we decided to go here by ourselves to force them to initiate their plan earlier. Three of us left and the other two were apprehended. We left the other two to explain what we had done and to be sent in here with the plan. We gave them one day to send the two of them in, so they should be here soon."

Alby stood up abruptly. "We need to prepare an ambush, then. Hidden snipers at the main entrance, or outside if they don't try to get into the building."

"Wait. No. We can't shoot at them!" Thomas protested.

"And why not?" Alby asked. "Are you on their side?"

"No, but I have seen the people they are going to send. Most of them are just scared civilians looking for a roof over their heads and protection from the Cranks. There are children and old people among them."

"Then what do you suggest we do? Throw down our arms and welcome them inside?"

"We could trap them. Lock them in a room somewhere. I'm sure at least some of them would be willing to change sides if they were given reason to think they would be treated well."

Alby shook his head. "Trusting them would be too risky, and we can't keep them locked in a room forever."

"But-"

"We can't just take your word that you're on our side. It would be stupid to do what you tell us to do."

Anger welled up inside of Thomas. "Do you really think I'm on their side?" He asked, trying to keep his cool.

"Thomas," said Joan, "I'm sorry, but you must see this from our perspective. You could have been sent here by the Right Arm to gain our trust and trick us. We want to believe you, but we can't take your suggestions on this matter into consideration."

The anger was gone, replaced by a cold sensation. Thomas felt like he had just been slapped in the face. He was trying to _help_ WICKED now, even if it was only temporarily. They should at least trust his desire to protect his friends. But then again, he had gone against WICKED before, in the simulation, when he had escaped. He had done that to protect his friends, too. It had been the wrong way to go about it. Running away guaranteed the death of one of the most important people in his life. He knew that now, and he wouldn't repeat that mistake, but what if they were all waiting for him to take off again? Waiting for him to side with their enemies and destroy them.

WICKED didn't trust Thomas. Fine then, Thomas didn't trust WICKED. He wasn't on their side, nor the Right Arm's. His allegiance was to Newt, and Teresa, and Minho, and everyone else who had suffered with him. If he needed WICKED's help to get something, he would do what needed to be done to get it, and then they would be done.

"I understand," Thomas said. Better to play along for now.

"Are there any other suggestions?" Joan asked the room.

"Um… if we do the attack, but just… don't shoot to kill unless they do that," said a small girl.

"Yes, we shouldn't kill anybody unless necessary," Joan said, leaving out the 'we probably won't have much of a choice, though'.

When nobody had any other ideas, Joan sent two people to check on the weapons, and said that they were going to have another meeting when they knew more about the Right Arm's plan.

People got up and left the room. Thomas wasn't sure what to do, or where he could go, but it turned out he didn't have to worry about that. Before he knew it he was surrounded by the other teens. Alby stood in the middle with him.

"Let's go," he said. He didn't offer further explanation, but Thomas didn't have any choice in the matter. The group around him was moving, and he didn't want to get trampled.

They left the meeting room and walked down a long corridor. As soon as they crossed a corner, Alby rounded on him.

"Tell us. Now. Who is alive? Where are the others? Don't you dare trick us."

Thomas got tongue-tied for a moment. He was back against a wall with fifty probably hostile teens looking at him expectantly. There were so many of them that they took up the whole corridor.

Thomas took a deep breath, collecting himself. He rattled off all the names of the people in group A that were still alive. Group B was harder. He didn't know many names. He tried to describe a few others by their appearance, but his memory wasn't good enough to recall everyone.

Still, they kept asking. Names— so many names, and he didn't know most of them.

He kept telling them that he didn't know, that Harriet and Newt would come soon and they would know, but the mob wouldn't quiet until Alby yelled at them to shut up. He looked at Thomas with immense dislike.

"You're saying Newt and Harriet are coming. Who else?"

"Teresa and Sonya."

"Only them? Everyone else is still locked away in that bunker?"

Thomas nodded.

"And the two who went with you and got caught?"

"Newt and Teresa. I'm sure they're fine. One of the men who chased us let me get away, and he told me they wouldn't get hurt."

"Anyone infected?"

Thomas was surprised to hear him ask that. The Flare hadn't been revealed to them before Alby had seemingly died. He must've been told by someone else.

"A girl in group B— I don't know her name. And… Newt."  
Alby's face fell. Thomas hadn't wanted to tell him; he knew that the two of them had been close, but lying wouldn't be any better.

"Both are okay, though. There's still time to find the cure."

"The cure? Really? I've seen the scientists, running around like headless chickens with no idea what to do. Either you're as stupid as those shanks or you're blindly loyal to them."

"You don't know that! You don't know what happened to the rest of us while you were here," Thomas said, clenching his fists.

"Walk with me, Thomas," Alby said. He sounded calm but it was a cold, steely kind of calm. "The rest of you, scram."

Alby walked down the corridor. The others walked in the opposite direction, and Thomas pushed past them to get to Alby. He wanted to know what the older boy had to say.

They walked until the other teens were long gone. All the while, Thomas waited for Alby to say something, but he didn't even _look_ at Thomas.

"We're alone. Are you going to answer my question now?" He asked.

"what?"

"How do you know we won't find a cure to the Flare?"

"Isn't it obvious? They've been going at it for years with no results. They will just get more and more desperate and their experiments will get worse until everyone is dead. They saved whoever they could and kept us here so we could be used when the active group got wiped out. I told you, I've seen the people here work. They're in the library for hours on end until they come up with some new idea that might work, and then they do some experiments and realise that it doesn't. One guy got infected a few months ago during one of those experiments. Took a while for anyone to realise, and by then his whole family had the virus. They had me and a few others take them out and get rid of the bodies since we couldn't get sick. They will keep trying until they destroy themselves, and they will make sure to take us with them. We should go to the Right Arm. We can help them take out the guards and then we can leave this place."

"Are you kidding me? The Right Arm is holding people hostage. They're holding _your friends_ hostage. And they wouldn't just let everyone go once they had this place, they are starting their own experiments!"

"Then we escape from them. They will be weakened after the attack. If everyone here unites with the ones who are captured, we can overpower them."

"And what about Newt? What do you think will happen to him if we escape and give up on the cure?"

"He doesn't stand a chance either way. If we stay to continue the useless research, _he_ will continue to get worse, until someone has to take him out before he can hurt somebody. If we let him accept his fate, he can at least go with some shucking dignity."

"Dignity?" Thomas said in disbelief. "You wanna know what happened the last time we tried to run away from WICKED?"

Alby began to say something, but Thomas wouldn't let him.

"We had to go into a city to remove these _things_ WICKED put in our heads. Of course, we couldn't bring an infected person into the city, so we left him in the berg to wait. When we returned, he was gone. He'd been taken to a Crank Palace. Do you know what that is? A Crank Palace?"

Again, he didn't wait for Alby's response.

"It's this small town, filthy and torn to pieces by all the Cranks that live there. The guards would remove the ones past the Gone, or so they said, but there were fights breaking out all over the place. It didn't help that the immunes who guarded the place were disappearing"

Alby paled. "And you left him there?"

"It's not like we _wanted_ to leave him there. We came to get him, but he told us to go away. He didn't want to be around us so we could watch him go insane. Do you want him to go to a place like that?"

"N-"

"But the story doesn't end there. He actually did make it out of the Crank Palace, and I happened upon him. Long story short, he made me kill him. There was nothing _dignant_ about it. It's either that all over again or staying, unless you plan on killing him before it happens."

"I will do it if he asks me to," Alby said, but he sounded strained

Thomas regarded Alby. He looked disturbed by the story. Thomas wondered if he was capable of killing a friend if asked, and decided that he didn't want to find out. He had to trust Newt not to make the request, that's what it came down to, in the end. Whether or not he believed he could be cured. Whether or not he believed Thomas. If he did, if he stayed, then surely Alby would stay, too. They had been friends for as long as they could remember, and Newt was just too shucking likeable to leave behind. _And if Alby can order the people here around like lackeys, they will go where he goes._

Alby was an important player in the game of WICKED and the Right Arm and the Flare. Annoyed as Thomas was, he had to stay in Alby's good graces, or as close as he could get to it, anyway. He decided to start with some friendly conversation.

"How are you not dead?"

Alby stared at him suspiciously. "What?"

"You heard me. You ran at half a dozen Grievers and they ripped you apart. We all saw it. How could you possibly have survived that?"

"You know what WICKED can do, don't you? How they can control us? They made me walk over there and I stood frozen in place, surrounded by Grievers. They moved around a bit, shoved at me, nicked me with their blades once or twice. They made you see what they wanted you to see. Got both your reactions and a living munie to keep as a reserve. They did the same thing with a few others, but they didn't have the manpower to keep them all."

Thomas nodded. He remembered how Alby had walked toward the Grievers; trancelike, calm. He hadn't screamed once as he was seemingly killed.

"Just one thing," Thomas said, " he was trying to get to you —Newt, I mean. I stopped him, but what if I hadn't? Would he be here with you right now if I hadn't?"

"Nah, they wanted him in the trials. He's important, I heard them say so. Not sure why, they have other control-subjects, but I heard what I heard. They might've killed me, the illusion wouldn't have worked if he'd got too close, but they seem to think I'm important, too. They might've frozen him in place, or made someone else hold him back. They might even have made a Griever fight him for a bit as a distraction."

Thomas felt relieved. For a moment he'd been afraid he'd made a terrible mistake. That maybe his friend wouldn't have gone to the Scorch and gotten infected. The moment was over.

"Maybe I should thank you," Alby said thoughtfully. "If it had been real, you would've saved his life. Or maybe you knew what WICKED was planning all along, and tried to help them. I'll be generous and believe you acted out of the goodness of your heart. For now."

Thomas snorted.

He considered saying something else, preferably something sarcastic, but a loud beeping blared from above.

"The alarm." Alby said.

"A fire?" Thomas guessed. "Oh. No, of course not. It's them, it has to be!"

"Time to see if you've been telling the truth, Greenie," Alby said. He was smiling, but not at Thomas. He ran down a corridor, and Thomas followed closely behind, knowing Alby would lead him to the entrance.

He was happy to reunite with Newt and Teresa, Harriet too, he supposed, But the happiness was made bittersweet by the knowledge that they would have to make their move now. Time was running short, and what they told him could change the game entirely.


	32. Before

_Author's note:_

 _I apologize for taking even longer than usual to write a new chapter, though in my defense it was largely due to NaNoWriMo. Merry Christmas and a happy new chapter._

* * *

Chapter 32: Before

Thomas was dismayed to find his path blocked. He heard it before he got close, but he hadn't expected the chaos he was faced with. Everyone in the building wanted to see what the commotion was about, which Thomas wouldn't have minded if he'd only got there before they did.

He couldn't even see where the entrance was. People were spilling out into the corridor in a loud river of excited faces and impatience.

"Excuse me," he said, trying to squeeze past a group of guys gathered at the back of the whole mess.

They didn't notice him, save for a short boy that Thomas could vaguely remember from the Glade. He didn't offer any help, only some sort of grimace that might be a contemptuous sneer.

"Hey! Alby! Some help over here?" Thomas shouted, trying to make himself heard over the noise.

Alby said something he couldn't quite make out. It wasn't anything pleasant, judging by how annoyed he looked.

Let us through," he ordered, and the crowd parted to let him through.

Thomas walked behind Alby as he cleared the path.

The entrance hall was a small room with see-through walls. A few uncomfortable-looking chairs had been pushed against the walls to make room, along with a white coffee table. A ceramic vase had fallen on the floor, lying in pieces on top of a piteous plastic sunflower. Thomas stepped over the chards carefully.

He could see the top of Harriet's head behind the people in the room, but he couldn't get any closer than that. The twenty or so girls from group B would not let anyone get past.

"Harriet!" He called. "Newt! Teresa!"

"Thomas?" He heard, faintly. It sounded like Harriet.

The crowd parted reluctantly, creating a pathway toward the center. He saw Harriet and a girl he didn't know who was hugging Group B's leader like a long-lost sister.

"Ximena," Harriet complained half-heartedly. Ximena let go. "I'm so glad to have you back, Harriet," she said.

"I'm glad too, but we don't have a lot of time. Get the girls out of here. Find out where Sonya is."

They fist-bumped and Ximena stepped aside, trying to steer up the crowd.

"Not that I'm not glad to see you, but where are the others?" Thomas asked, looking around the room as if Newt and Teresa were hiding behind something and he could find them if he looked enough.

The softness had left Harriet's voice when she spoke.

"They let me take Sonya with me here. A medic took her away as soon as we entered. Teresa and Newt are with the Right Arm. The plan is to bring them with once they attack."

"Oh." The small bubble of hope that had grown within him burst, touched by something razor-sharp.

"Then we have to… to come up with a plan. We need to…" Thomas gestured vaguely. Go somewhere to discuss, get everyone to shut up so he could think. His thoughts were occupied by his friends, being held somewhere by enemies. Had they gone back to that stupid base of theirs? Were they out in the cold forest, just out of sight? What if they had tried to escape? What if they had both been killed while trying to escape? No, they wouldn't. They had to keep up the pretense of cooperation. They were fine- they were too important to be harmed. But what if?

"Stop loitering in the corridors! You're clogging them for goodness' sake! Go to the Big room immediately!" A woman commanded. He recognized her as Joan, the leader of sorts he had met earlier.

The entry hall and the corridors emptied quickly, leaving only Thomas, Harriet, Joan, and Alby. Alby glared at Joan, muttering "I had the situation under control."

"Harriet, welcome. I'm Joan," Joan said hurriedly. "Do you know how much time we have before they come?"

"No. I was told we would know when the time was right to let them in."

 _A good idea,_ Thomas thought, _makes it harder for us to plan something if we don't know the specifics._ The question was whether it meant that he and Harriet and were supposed to come up with a plan to distract the guards and open the doors, or whether it meant the Right Arm had a distraction of their own planned.

Thomas had meant to sit next to Harriet in the Big room, but she was pulled into a seat amid a group of her old friends, and Thomas ended up next to Alby. Gladers had squeezed in on Alby's other side, but the seats next to Thomas remained vacant, despite the lack of space on the other side.

"I told you the Right Arm would send them," Thomas told Alby, but the older boy only scowled. "You said they would send Newt. Remember him? Tall guy, has an accent?"

"I expected they would send all of them, but Harriet and Sonya still came, didn't they?" Thomas wished he hadn't said anything from the beginning.

"Who's Sonya?" Alby asked.

"She's in group B and she's here. Or, somewhere in here at least."

"I still don't know where my friend is," Alby grumbled.

"Neither do I. Ask Harriet."

Alby glared and turned away.

"Quiet down!" Joan ordered. "Alright. Harriet, tell us about the Right Arm."

Harriet cleared her throat. "They captured me, along with Sonya, Thomas, and the others in Group A and B. They sent a few of us to a building nearby to wait until we could help them with their plan. She looked at Thomas. "Thomas ran here because they were taking too long. Teresa and Newt were with him, but they were captured. A few hours after that they took Sonya and me to their camp a few minutes away from here. Teresa and Newt were there- I think they're going to be brought in with the Right Arm. They didn't tell me what to do, only that I would know when the time was right, and they wanted me to give this to Thomas." She rolled a water bottle over the table, and Thomas caught it. He turned it over, inspecting every angle. Metallic, a bit warm, heavy. Nothing out of the ordinary. He pulled off the cap and peered inside. A brown liquid made darker by the lighting and strong-smelling.

"It's not poison. I had some earlier, and so did the Right-Arm people."

Thomas closed the bottle, assuming it contained some sort of alcohol. A joke, perhaps.

"Is that it?" Joan asked.

Harriet nodded. "Will you help us?"

"Of course we will. We need to make a plan immediately. Harriet, Thomas, I'm afraid you need to leave."

"What? We need to know the plan!" Thomas protested.

At the same time, Harriet said "they are _our_ friends. You can't expect us to trust you with their lives!"

"And the two of you can't expect _us_ to trust _you._ You may be working with the Right Arm for all we know."

"We're not. They captured us." Harriet spoke slowly.

"If you want your friends to be saved, then we're on the same side. This should not be a problem."

"And how are we supposed to know that you're not lying to us if you won't let us stay?" Thomas asked. He knew any argument would be discarded, but what else was there to do?

"You came to us for help. We are trying to help. You must be hungry, maybe you should go to the kitchen. Alby, will you accompany them?"

There was no point in trying to resist. While he couldn't trust anyone from WICKED, he knew that they wouldn't let anybody steal their subjects and keep them. The goal of their trial was to get to where he was now. All of them were supposed to be here, but they had been interrupted by the Right Arm. WICKED would make sure to fix the mistake.

He wasn't sure what the trial would have been like without the interruption. Nothing significant had happened before their capture save for the run-in with the Cranks. There were probably traps in the forest that would have raised the stakes. Would they have to partake in a new trial to make up for the faulty one?

Unless the trial had not been a failure.

With all their resources, would WICKED really be unaware that their rivals were hiding so close to them? And even if they were, there was no doubt that they had some means of surveying their subjects. The fact that they did not intervene would indicate cooperation. Could that be the case? It wouldn't be above WICKED, but there were other possibilities. From what he had seen, they were understaffed. Maybe they wanted to lure the Right Arm to home territory and get rid of them once and for all. They might not have the numbers to risk a rescue mission, so they waited until they could outsmart them. And the ones discussing strategy in the big room were not only those who worked for WICKED. There were people from groups A and B, who would certainly not condone such methods.

"Get up, greenie," Alby grumbled.

Thomas did just that, leaving the room with the bottle clutched in his fist, next to Harriet, who was making her anger know by glaring at each of the adults in the room.

Alby closed the door behind them, and they stopped.

"That door's soundproof, you won't hear anything," he said, "may as well go to the kitchen like she said."

"Screw the kitchen. Take me to Sonya," Harriet demanded.

"Who?"

"You know very well who she is. Now take me to her, unless you want me to reconsider helping the Right Arm!"

"I _don't_ know who that is, and I don't give a klunk about the answer! And I don't care who you're helping as long as I get my friends back."

"This is why we shouldn't have sided with WICKED in the first place," Harriet said, glaring at Thomas this time.

"He's not part of WICKED. He used to be the leader of my group," Thomas explained.

"He still knows where they took her!"

Thomas looked at Alby, who was rolling his eyes.

"I know where she _might_ be, if you quit yelling."

Thomas recognized the corridor Alby led them to. The door to the room he had woken up in stood open, though they walked past, to the one next to it.

Two grey-haired women in scrubs were dashing about the room, barely stopping to look at them as they went inside. He didn't see Sonya at first, until he noticed the dirty blond hair sticking out from behind a curtain.

"Sonya!" Harriet pushed past one of the doctors to get to her friend, but the woman held her back.

"Please, she is in an unstable condition," the doctor said.

Harriet shook her off. "Then fix her! I'm not stopping you!"

The woman shook her head and returned to whatever she was doing. "If you won't leave, you might as well help. Get that brown bottle on the top shelf, and the one next to it."

Harriet helped prepare whatever procedure they were doing, but the woman said that three people were enough and shooed the boys out.

They went to the kitchen for some food while they were waiting.

"You're lucky. There's still some chicken left," Alby said, taking out a covered bowl from a refrigerator.

"This doesn't look dried or anything. Do you have a chicken coop in the yard?" Thomas asked as he inspected the meat.

"Not here. WICKED's got some farms nearby that send food. Some of 'em, anyway."

"Why only some? Is it because of the Flare?"

"So they say."

The chicken was cold and tasted burnt, ironically enough. It was still the best thing he'd tasted in a long time. Most food to be found was stale and dry, and the rare piece of meat was salted to last longer. He had unconsciously concluded that all food would be like that forever; that maybe wildlife had just died out, and only a few types of grains and roots could be grown. It was funny how a dead bird gave him hope. It reminded him of warm summer days, soft grass under bare feet, the crackling of a grill and the wonderful smells wafting from it.

"What's with the happy-face, Slinthead?"

Thomas looked up from the chicken. "Do you want some?"

"Nah. I'm more curious about what you've got in the bottle."

Thomas shook the bottle once, the liquid within sloshing about. "Alcohol, I think."

Alby took the bottle from him and pulled the lid open. "Whiskey," he concluded after smelling it cautiously.

"You can have it if you want," Thomas offered. He didn't think getting drunk was what he needed at the moment, not that he liked the smell of it in the first place.

"You take a sip and wait a few minutes, and I'll gladly take it off your hands." He handed back the bottle.

"Not trying to poison you," Thomas mumbled as he poured some of the liquid into a glass.

"Bottoms up."

He felt the strong taste and wanted to spit it out, but he swallowed it all. He couldn't help but grimace. Alby waited to see if he would die or not.

"How'd you know it's whiskey, anyway?" Thomas asked between bites of chicken.

"Ben found some a few weeks back. Best night of our lives and one of the worst mornings." Alby smiled, before remembering who he was talking to. "Ya don't look dead, Shank, so I might as well."

He took several deep swallows straight from the bottle, without any hesitation, though he pulled a face afterward, as Thomas had.

"Man, that's some good stuff. Maybe the Right Arm's not so bad."

"It's not like they're holding our friends captive or anything," Thomas said.

"I'd let them keep Gally if they got me some more of this."

A loud _Bang_! Followed by loud voices made Thomas jump.

Alby snorted. "The meeting's over, you chicken."

"That's not funny."

"You are what ya eat, shank."

"Whatever. I'm going to see what they decided."

He put down the empty plate on his way out of the kitchen. Alby didn't follow, but he knew how to get to the big room on his own.

He hoped they would at least tell him what the plan was. He had, after all, an important role in this matter. He could at the very least be certain that the plan would be good. This was much too important for WICKED to mess up, and they were not lacking in the mental department. It had been an awfully short meeting, though that may be a good sign.

He hoped there was still somebody in the room who could tell him. Judging by the lack of sound from that direction, it was mostly deserted by now.

"Excuse me, is there—" He stopped abruptly. He'd walked around the corner —ready for some answers— and found a body, motionless on the floor.

He rushed at the doorway. If there was a Crank or an enemy, they'd have heard him by now. He looked inside, ready to run or fight, but all he found were still bodies, dozens of them. Dead?

He knelt by the one halfway through the door. It was Ben, he realized. He thought the boy had died once already, was it for real this time?

No. His pulse was strong, and he could see his back rising and falling with each breath. No evident damage. He turned the body over to make sure, but there was no sign of any physical injury. He checked two more bodies to make sure, but they were the same. All were asleep. Maybe a poisonous gas.

They had lost consciousness, Ben had tried to escape but was too late. It had dissipated quickly because he felt just fine. Now he had the attacker to worry about.

It had to be the Right Arm. Someone on the inside, a spy. He ran to the kitchen. Survival was easier in a group, assuming Alby was neither asleep nor drunk.

"Did someone tell ya there's more chicken?" Alby asked, looking as impatient with him as always.

"They're asleep! All of them," Thomas said, slightly out of breath.

"What?"  
"In the big room. I went there and they were just lying on the floor."

Alby stood up abruptly. "They're dead?! Who—"

"No, I told you, they're asleep. They looked fine, except—"

"They were asleep, I get it! What do you expect me to do about it?"

"We need to see if Harriet and those doctors are still awake. They might know something. Was there anyone else who wasn't in the room when we left?"

"No." Alby followed Thomas, running through the corridor. Whoever was in the building was sure to hear them, but it was easier to outrun than hide from somebody who might have access to security cameras.

Alby wanted to check on his friends in the big room, but there was no time. They had to see if the others were with them, and if they weren't, then that was all the more reason to go there. They had been about to perform some kind of surgery on Sonya, and if the doctors had fallen asleep during it they had to get there fast.

He relaxed a bit when he heard shuffling and muttering from the inside. Inside he saw Harriet standing by Sonya, pressing a bloody towel to the back of her head. The two doctors were sprawled on the floor.

"Don't just stand there. Get some help, you sticks!" Harriet shouted.

"There is no help. Everybody's asleep," Thomas said.

Everyone except for the three of them. But why?

The whiskey, if that's even what it was. Of course! They wanted him to drink it for a reason. They had given Harriet some for a reason. Everybody who had not drunk it was unconscious. They had taken the antidote.

"Somebody's in here. They sent poison gas through the building and that drink protects us from being affected," Thomas said.

"So get the bottle then!" Harriet said.

"Alby, do you have it?" Thomas asked.

"It's in the kitchen. I'll get it."

"You can't! Somebody's in here. You weren't supposed to stay conscious, who knows what they'll do if they find you."

"We need the antidote! Sonya might be dying and I don't know what to do. We need to wake up the doctors!" Harriet argued.

Alby left, running at full speed. If he hadn't gone, Harriet might have, and she was the only one who knew what was up with Sonya.

Thomas rummaged through drawers in search of a weapon. All he found were a few scalpels and a pair of scissors. They wouldn't do much against a gun or a launcher, but he wasn't going down without a fight.

"Make yourself useful and get a clean towel," Harriet said.

Thomas obliged. Harriet folded it and pressed it to her friend's head, tossing the old towel over her shoulder. There was a lot of blood on it, he noted.

"What did they do to her?" He asked.

"They had to remove something from her head, said it was keeping her from waking up."

"What is 'something'?"

"I don't know what it was. It was the size of a pebble and covered in blood, but I didn't get a closer look. Anyway, they were about to stitch her up when they collapsed."

"They didn't tell you how to do that, perchance? Use thread and needle, I mean."

"I know how to do it. If you come over here and hold this against the wound, I should be able to…" Harriet swallowed hard, looking absolutely disgusted.

It seemed to work, not that Thomas was looking anywhere near the stitches. He moved the towel a bit to the side every other minute so Harriet could reach the area.

"Did the doctors show any symptoms before passing out?" He asked.

Harriet took a while to respond. "Drowsiness and dizziness, but not anything else that I noticed."

"It doesn't tell us much. Hopefully, it's just a sedative, but it could be anything."

"If somebody in here used the gas, there must be a container for it that says what it is. That guy knows this place. If he knows where they keep stuff like that, we might be able to find it, unless the person has it with them."

"What if they brought it with them from outside the building? Then there probably won't be more of it or any documents about it. Alby wouldn't have a clue either."

"This place is too well-guarded. They wouldn't let somebody bring something like that inside for no reason and not record it somewhere."

"I suppose it makes more sense to use something that's already in the building, then. It's easier, at least," Thomas admitted, "but we can't expect to find what we need just lying around. The attacker knows we're here."

"Wait. If they are from the Right Arm, why are the others not here yet? What's the point of hiding from us?"

"Could be a loyalty test, or something more psychological."

"The Right Arm is not WICKED. I don't think they have the brains to plan out variables and get anything from them."

"Maybe the attacker is scared we'll try something before the backup gets here," Thomas suggested, though he wasn't all that sure as he started to really think about it.

He put away the blood-stained towel as Harriet finished the last stitch. It looked neat, even though the thread had turned red, and it wasn't bleeding anymore. The sight of blood in blond hair reminded him of Newt, that day on the train when he had clawed at his head in a Flare-induced fit. But this wasn't his friend; it was his friend's sister. Newt was out there somewhere, and she was here.

It dawned on him then.

"I don't think the attacker is inside the building at all. I think you and Sonya brought something here."

"How? Was it in our clothes, or…" Harriet checked the pockets on her clothes but didn't find anything.

The door flew open, slamming into a cabinet with a loud clang.

Thomas held up the scissors menacingly, but it was only Alby.

"Put the scissors down, shank. I got you the bottle. Still some left, I think."

Thomas crouched on the floor, bottle in hand, next to the nearest of the two doctors. She had fallen on her stomach and he had to turn her over. His attention was immediately drawn to something dark red that had been beneath her. A small thing, no larger than a pea, right out of the clutches of a pair of pincers right next to it.

"Is that the thing..?" He gestured vaguely at his head.

"Yeah," Harriet confirmed. She knelt next to him to examine it up close, and Thomas, meanwhile, returned to his task.

He poured some of the antidote into the woman's mouth, just enough to make sure it would go down, and waited. There was no immediate reaction, though that didn't necessarily mean it wasn't working.

Harriet had plucked the thing up with the pincers and was rinsing it carefully with tap water.

He looked over her shoulder and saw a tiny, metallic tube with a hole in one side. Seeing it made his brain tingle. Some distant memory was trying to push its way to the surface.

"Do either of you know what that is?" He asked.

"I think I've seen somethin' like it, but I can't remember where," Alby said.

Harriet turned it over, observing from every angle.

"If they _did_ send us in with poisonous gas, couldn't it have been in here?"

The memory made it through, finally, and Thomas knew exactly what it was.

"Those tubes contain gases, which are kept in by a thin surface. They're designed to break easily, and they are put in a person's head so that it prevents consciousness. To wake the person up, it has to be removed, and removing it will break the tube and release the gas. They were made illegal, but WICKED kept some around, like they were souvenirs." He could remember somebody showing it to him, in a voice that was too blurred to identify.

"So there's nobody in here with us?" Alby asked.

"Probably not. They just needed to make sure we could let them in without being stopped," Harriet said

"I think there might be more to it," Thomas speculated. "They want to make sure we won't plan an ambush with WICKED, or at least that we won't be able to carry it out alone."

"Then they succeeded. They're probably coming any minute and we can't do anything to stop them," Alby scowled.

"Not necessarily," Harriet argued. "If we think fast, we might come up with something."

Thomas nodded. "Alby, would you mind showing us all the weapons you've got hidden away in here?"


	33. The Storm

_Author's Note:_

 _This chapter is a bit short, but I hope you like it all the same._

* * *

Chapter 33: The Storm.

"These won't do." Thomas dropped the launcher back into the crate. It clattered against the dozen or so replicas of it.

"Why not?" Alby asked. "If one of you welcome them inside, the other one can hide with me in the defense-posts. With all of them in a big group, we can take them down with only a few shots from our launchers."

"I already told you. It's too risky. If we're not fast enough, they'll return fire. Even if we hit all of them, the effects will wear off in a few minutes. We need time to lock them someplace they can't escape from, and we need to take anything they can use to communicate with. Not to mention that they have Newt and Teresa."

"So we hit them again before they can get up and we grab Newt and the girl. There's protective gear in the next room, so we won't get shocked if we touch them."

"Isn't there another way that doesn't involve torture?" Harriet questioned. "Like what they did to the others here. We can lock them in a room and send the gas inside from the vents."

"That sounds like the safest option," Thomas said and turned towards Alby. "Do you have something that could work?"

Alby considered. "In there." He pointed at a line of shotguns.

Thomas was confused and about to protest until Alby pushed the guns aside to reveal a small cabinet standing on the floor.

Thomas and Harriet knelt behind him to see the contents. An array of labeled containers and some other equipment stood inside. He read the neat writing on the containers. He recognized some names, such as teargas, but others were stranger.

"What is 'DA463'?" He asked, reading from the largest canister.

"You don't want that one," Harriet assured him. "It's painless, unnoticeable until you collapse, but it will kill you within two minutes of coming into contact with it."

"How do you know?"

She shrugged, looking confused herself. He supposed it was no stranger than the flashes of previous knowledge that would hit him from time to time.

Alby turned the container to read the back, where the effects had apparently been written.

"You're right. So which one _should_ we use?" He asked.

"Maybe… that one," Harriet decided, taking a medium-sized container from the cabinet. She read out the description.

"Inhalation of gas causes sleep. Takes effect within one minute of inhaling. Induces sleep for four to six hours. Potential side effects: Nausea. headache."

"That sounds good enough, but how do we get the shanks to inhale it?" Alby asked. "If we pass out too, there's no point in doing it."

"We need to lock them in a room and get the gas through the vents. It's like you said, Alby: We only need one person to greet them. The other two can pump in the gas and put the shanks in cells." Thomas frowned. "You do have cells here, right Alby?"

"Course we do. And I think I know where we can lock 'em in."

"Great. Show us," Thomas said. Things were going strangely well for once.

"Right, we're leaving now. You two, by the door."

Alby, trusting as always, was concerned that they would pick up weapons from the room and kill him. He had therefore locked the room with a code only known to him. In his own words: 'Kill me and you starve to death in here.'

He made them stand by the door to make sure they wouldn't attack him from behind as he unlocked the door.

"Wait. Before we go there, we should check on Sonya," Harriet said.

"We don't have time," Alby protested.

"She could be dead or something! We are going there. It's not far, and we can plan on the way."

"Let's just go there," Thomas said before Alby had the time to argue. It was true they were short on time, or rather, they didn't know how much time they had, but they assumed it wasn't much. Still, it wouldn't do to start fighting. Also, what if Sonya _had_ stopped breathing while they were gone?

Sonya's breathing was just fine. They had decided that the unconsciousness must have been the same kind everybody else was suffering from at the moment. The antidote clearly had to be ingested prior to exposure, because it hadn't worked on the doctor earlier. They would have to wait and see. Their discussion during the visit consisted largely of Alby complaining over the pointlessness of going there, and Harriet glaring at him. They were definitely not going to become friends in the foreseeable future. Maybe it was their corresponding roles as the leaders of their respective groups. They were like magnets with the same charge, repelled.

After checking up on Sonya, Alby led them to a large, L-shaped laboratory. It had two doors, one leading back to the corridor and another to the outside. Harriet took a look at the vents leading into the room, while Thomas checked out all the things in the room.

The lab was clearly in use. One table had a messy stack of papers, along with a microscope and some test tubes with colored liquids inside of them. Maybe the experiment had been interrupted when Harriet and Sonya arrived.

He moved the things to a cupboard, where they were less likely to be smashed.

He began reading one of the papers, to see what the experiment had been about. The text spoke of enzymes and duplication of something. He guessed it was to see what would kill the Flare-virus, though the notes were much too messy to really understand.

He shivered as a gust of cold wind swept into the room and turned to see that Alby had opened the door. He joined the older boy by the door out of curiosity, putting the paper aside.

"Why is there even a door here?" He didn't see anything special, only a plain landscape dusted with snow. He took a step out, despite the cold, but Alby yanked him back by the shirt-collar.

"What was that for? Do you have poison arrows shooting from the ground if you step on it?"

"It's a trap door, actually. You stand right there and the ground swallows you up. Cranks are always useful for research, and if we catch a wolf…"

Thomas was glad they'd had chicken. "Is there anything in there now?" He asked.

"Doesn't sound like it. Still, we better put some planks over there unless you wanna make yourself some more enemies."

Thomas let Alby put up a makeshift bridge over the pit, as he studied the door closer.

"Is this the lock?" He poked a screen with buttons underneath.

Alby glanced over his shoulder. "Yeah. Just put in the code and they won't get through with a battering ram."

Harriet walked up to them. "I think it should work, but we need to separate the vents in here from the ones in the adjacent rooms. I'm not sure where they lead, but we can't risk the gas getting everywhere."

"Check the control room. They wouldn't have the gases next to the weapons unless they wanted to use them, so it shouldn't be hard to find a way to block the vents." Alby said.

The control room was a large room in the middle of the building. There were monitors, showing surveillance over the building, both inside and out. A few computers were placed on a large desk, the control part of the control room. There was an assortment of machines, and several large pipes that continued into the floor or ceiling. Most notable of these machines was the air-conditioner. Thomas approached the humming box and was greeted by a warm wind. He looked around for a control panel but didn't find one.

"It's got to be controlled through the computers," Harriet said.

Alby had the password to the computer system, but he didn't know much about how the programs on it worked. The three of them were able to find a file about the ventilation-system quickly enough, and it seemed that it had, in fact, been designed to keep the air in any room from being transported to the rest if needed. It was a necessary precaution when studying Cranks, as Alby claimed they did. Another vent could be opened, one which lead to a tank of oxygen under the floor. The air refilled automatically from outside, but several filters were applied to keep out most hazardous things. Using a map they found, they adjusted the ventilation-system to their requirements.

"That's it, right? It will work?" Thomas asked. He looked from Harriet to Alby, but neither seemed entirely sure.

"It _should_ work, but I think we need a backup plan in case something goes wrong," Harriet said.

"Yeah," Alby agreed, "I think I should hide in the lab with a launcher. If the gas doesn't work, you're gonna get torn to pieces by the Right Arm."

Torn to pieces… Thomas shuddered, remembering the illusion back in the maze. He looked away and saw something move in one of the cameras, from outside.

"It's them." He got closer to the camera to get a better look at the tiny people on screen. A group of twenty people was approaching the building, beginning to split up to check all sides. He tried to spot his friends, but there was no way to make out who was who beneath the hats and hoods.

"We need to go!" Harriet commanded.

They ran back to the lab, doing their best to talk at the same time.

"I know how to pump the gas through the vents!" Harriet said.

"Then I'll open the door!" Thomas replied. He wanted to see Newt and Teresa as soon as possible, and he knew that they would catch on to what he was doing. The telepathy was still not working, but he could say what he needed to with just his eyes. They would help him if the plan didn't work, and he could make sure they wouldn't get hurt. Alby was going to hide in the room as backup, in one of the so-called 'defense-posts, which were built-in cupboards with small hatches that could be opened to fire through. It made him feel safer, even though Alby's purpose was to shoot everybody with a launcher, including him.

Harriet began setting up the equipment, and Thomas and Alby went into the lab in preparation. Angry fists were banging on the door. Alby was moving the furniture that stood in front of the hiding spot while telling Thomas the code to the door. Thomas paced back and forth, filled with nervous energy.

"Alby!" Harriet called from the other room. "We need two people to use this!"

Alby looked at Thomas, and to his surprise, he looked concerned. "You gonna be okay, Greenie?" He asked.

"Yes. Now hurry!"

Muffled voices were shouting outside, getting increasingly loud

Thomas walked to the open doorway. "I have to let them in now," he said.

Harriet was sat on Alby's shoulders, trying to get a hose into the air vent in the ceiling.

"We're almost done. Do it," Harriet said.

Thomas shut the door, putting in the code. The door could be unlocked from both sides, but nobody was getting through without the password.

He approached the front door in quick steps but hesitated with his hand on the lock. If the plan didn't work, nothing would protect him against the angry people. Still, this was what he had to do.

He typed in the code, and the door made a little clicking sound that sounded much louder than it should have. He pushed down on the door-handle. Too late to change his mind. He had to get them inside quickly and then stall for as long as possible once they were in place.

"Hey! There you are!" He said as the door was pulled open by a few people he recognized only vaguely. They looked excessively grumpy, shivering in the cold wind despite their thick clothing. It had begun snowing lightly.

"Over here!" One of them called to his companions who had been looking for other entrances. The call was repeated and people were soon streaming through the doorway. Hot air was no longer being transported into the room, but it was still a significant improvement from the snow.

He moved to let them pass. Two long tables were strategically placed near the opening, almost forming a barricade with only a narrow gap between them to get past. Thomas placed himself there, trying to look casual with one hand on a table, leaning on it. He would slow them down if only slightly. He did not want them to get to the locked door on the other side of the room. He would have to move to lock the other door, to prevent escape before the gas could spread throughout the room. Thankfully the last person to enter closed the door behind her, which meant half the job was done.

He looked at their sullen, frost-bitten faces. None of them were the faces he had hoped to see. He couldn't even find Brenda. Where were they? Outside the building? Were they on their way, or waiting as backup? How many more were out there? He tried to count them, but they were moving too much, and it didn't even matter. He had counted twenty people around the building on the camera, but more could be lurking in the nearby forest.

He was sure that Harriet and Alby had released the gas by now, or were going to any second. The door had hopefully been closed when they did it, and in that case, everybody had inhaled it. The unlocked door wouldn't have mattered much if they had all inhaled the gas, but with people outside, it was dangerous. He needed to lock the door, but he had to make his way there without raising suspicion. He knew that they would want to get past him, so he stayed in place, waiting. He knew that the gas was supposed to go unnoticed until it took effect, but what if it hadn't been pumped in yet? He would just have to wait until he could get out of the way, lock the door, and hope for the best.

"Move!" Ethan —the guy Thomas had met earlier— was glaring daggers at him. Ethan's friend Rose was doing the same next to him. Thomas moved out of their way, looking around for the third member of the trio. He wasn't there. He supposed the guy was too young to go on missions.

The group walked between the two tables, slowly, as only one person at a time would fit. Thomas edged out of their path and closer to the lock.

The first few people were around the corner. Any second now… There they came; the angry shouts, the obscenities. They were still processing the locked door, but soon they would turn around.

He tried to hide his hand on the lock-panel, only glancing at it carefully to put in the code, but they noticed it all the same. The door clicked, locked. He still didn't feel tired. A horrible thought struck him then. What if this gas was the same they had used against WICKED? The one everybody in the room would be unaffected by.

They were advancing on him now. He reasoned with himself, that if the gas went undetected until the last second, surely Ben wouldn't have had the time to open the door and attempt to escape.

A large woman grabbed him by the front of his shirt. "What do you think you're doing, kid?! Why is the door locked?!" She demanded. Thomas stayed still. He knew that it would be over the moment he started a fight.

"Answer!" She pushed him against the door. He hissed in pain as his head struck a metal pipe.

"I have no idea!" He said, as innocent as he could possibly sound. "Harriet. She must have betrayed us!"

The woman didn't release him. The buttons on the panel were digging into his back. She held out a hand, and a nervous-looking guy handed her a knife.

"I don't like hurting kids, but if you don't unlock that door right now…" She put the edge of the blade against his cheek.

Thomas knew there was nothing he could do. If he unlocked either of the doors, he would lose. He would rather die here. If the Right Arm took the building, he wouldn't be any better off. He could only hope that Harriet and Alby would find a way to neutralize the enemy by themselves.

He lost the strength to stand upright. The woman dropped him in surprise at the sudden shift in weight. He sagged until he sat on the floor. He was going to die. He didn't even know where his friends were, and he never would. He closed his eyes. There were so many things he wanted to say, so much he wanted to do. It wasn't fair.

No, not fair at all, but all the fight had left him. Death sure seemed relaxing.

His ears were like old radios, switching from high volume to low, buzzing all the while. He heard thuds around him, but he didn't feel like opening his eyes to see what was going on.

It was just like falling asleep.


End file.
